


transparent child and iridescent blood

by uraniasgl0ry



Category: Naruto
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Supernatural Elements, Alternate Universe - Vampire, Doctor!Sakura, Eventual Romance, Inspired by Music, M/M, Twilight References, Vampire!Sasuke, bartender!Naruto, i don't know they're dumb and fall in love and he's a vampire
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-08-31
Updated: 2020-11-09
Packaged: 2021-03-06 23:00:31
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 30,196
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26216797
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/uraniasgl0ry/pseuds/uraniasgl0ry
Summary: Naruto stared for a second with his mouth part opened, and felt his face go red. “This- this whole situation should be illegal. You can’t, and I mean can’t, aren’t allowed to, just come to me, HIT ON ME, be a fucking VAMPIRE and then just laugh at me after you BITE ME” he pointed his chest, still embarrassed, but blaming everything on the fucking Dracula.
Relationships: Haruno Sakura & Uzumaki Naruto, Haruno Sakura/Yamanaka Ino (implied), Uchiha Sasuke/Uzumaki Naruto
Comments: 24
Kudos: 74





	1. turn the lights off (tally hall)

**Author's Note:**

> Okay, before we get started !!
> 
> \- Some tags may change with time!  
> \- Every chapter title is a song! So! Sometimes the song just matches the vibe of the chapter, but more often, some lyrics also match. You can find those lyrics at the beginning of the chapter hehe  
> \- This is my first fic ever and it's not even written in my native tongue....... I'm very nervous please have mercy on me
> 
> That's it have fun !!!

_Everybody likes to get taken for turns  
To see how bright the fire inside of us burns  
And everybody wants to get evil tonight  
But all good devils masquerade under the light_

The moon upon them, the clinking of alcohol bottles inside the plastic bag while they were walking, some laughs and suddenly they were in front of an unknown door. The sky was dark, the night was young and he was so excited he couldn’t stop bouncing around. If Naruto had to think of it, he hadn’t paid enough attention to know how they had arrived there, and that implied he didn’t even know how to come back home. Not that he cared, though.

“Sakuraaa” he said, lengthening the last vowel until sound died in his throat. “Why aren’t we inside already”. Sakura looked at him in a way that made Naruto fear for his life for a moment, and clicked her tongue. “Stop being five, Naruto. It’s not like I’m not trying”. Then she took her phone out again and searched again for a contact in her list. Patience wasn’t his best virtue, and on top of that, listening to the music inside and not being able to enter the apartment was so fucking exasperating.

Just in time to catch Naruto groaning out loud, the music inside became louder as the door opened. A blonde girl threw herself to Sakura’s arms, giving her no time to do anything more than gasping. “Hey Ino!” Naruto greeted and smiled willingly, feeling like he’d seen the light, and he didn’t even wait for her answer as he rushed to go inside.

He gave a quick look to the room, trying to recognize faces, and then laughed out loud out of happiness and screamed. “KIBA!” He left the alcohol in the first table he found and literally jumped on Kiba, who was talking to someone on the couch. He looked upset at the beginning, but that must have been fake, because it took him less than ten seconds to laugh too. “Isn’t it Uzumaki fucking Naruto!” he struggled a little bit to get Naruto out of the couch, and then they smiled at each other and Naruto felt his heart leap. God, it’d been so long since he had seen his friends for the last time.

“Did you miss me! Don’t you dare to lie, I know you have”. Moments later they were talking animatedly and he had a plastic cup in his hands, which Kiba was filling with something (probably vodka).

It turned out that those people Kiba was talking to were Neji and Tenten, and then wandering around he found and greeted most of the people he’d been missing. The air was heavy from a mix between the heat from the heaters and the people, but his hands felt warm and his head, clear. It was early February, and most of his friends had been having exams until now, so two months could have passed since last time they reunited… hell, he was ecstatic to see them.

This was slightly different than most of the times they saw each other, though, because there was a lot of people he didn’t know (like, they were in the house of someone he hadn’t even met), but exams were over so it wasn’t weird at all for Naruto to sneak in university students’ parties just to see his pals. Thinking about it, maybe he was the smartest of them all; he got the best of uni life without actually going to college.

After a while, he went to check Sakura out, since he hadn’t seen her since they’d entered the house. He found her serving herself another drink, and when they made eye contact, she frowned. “You traitor” she said, and Naruto didn’t know what he’d done, but he felt like he probably deserved that. Sakura could be so scary sometimes.

“Why would you leave me alone with Ino like that!” Naruto looked at her, dubitative. “But I thought you liked her!”, Sakura instantly looked at the roof and took a desperate sip of her drink. Then she lowered her voice and looked at Naruto as if he was an adorable kitten that had just scratched her favourite shirt. “Naruto, that’s not how it works. She was drunk and I had no time to react so it was probably the worst gay panic in my. Whole. Life. You can’t leave someone alone like that. That's treason”.

Then her gaze went beyond Naruto and she arched her eyebrows at the realization of something. “Hey Sasuke!” she called, and waved her hand as she surpassed Naruto to greet that person. Uh, he couldn’t recall any Sasuke.

He turned around to see Sakura talking enthusiastically with a tall guy, with pale skin and deep black hair. He was looking at her with no interest at all, and he carried these kind of subtle emo vibes that shouldn’t be legal after My Chemical Romance split up and that era was officially closed. Still, there was something about his face that made him so pretty. Ugh. He emitted bad vibes. Naruto trusted his gut and just looked at him with narrowed eyes, finished his drink and turned on his heel to look for Shikamaru.

He made a bet with Kiba earlier that night that he’d buy him dinner at his favourite place if Naruto got Shikamaru drunk, and that could end up in a disaster, but what the heck, he was obviously going to give it a try. Moreover, his head was starting to feel fuzzy and his fingers, funny.

Hours later, some people had already left and Naruto was having a bad time with his balance. The get-Shikamaru-drunk plan had ended with Shikamaru actually sober and Naruto super drunk. He started giggling slightly, feeling his body light and the air in the room heavy over his shoulders. Not that he was surprised at the outcome, Shikamaru was an impossible jerk.

Turned out that the owner of the house was a friend Kiba met in university (what was his name? Shinji? Shino?) and he let them take over his living room until next morning as long as everything was left in place, so now they were going to sleep over there? Somehow? He wasn’t tired at all though, so he’d make Kiba stay up with him or something. At the moment, he was talking animatedly with Lee, who was suggesting a wrist wrestling match (which was BIG YES from him) when he saw the dark haired boy Sakura was greeting earlier by the corner of his eye.

Naruto’s gaze went to him, and saw Sakura’s friend make a sided smile to a girl he was talking to. Naruto rolled with eyes. So he was that kind of guy. Shortly after that, the couple got lost in a room and Naruto lost interest. He didn’t like him a bit, but that girl seemed content with that light flirting, so he just turned his attention back to Lee and started to giggle uncontrollably. It was just. Lee’s haircut was so funny and weird and horrible he couldn’t control himself when there was alcohol in his organism.

Lee beat him up in the wrist wrestling fight.

Then suddenly it was seven in the morning and he was watching the sky go clearer through the window. At this point only his friends remained (except Shikamaru, who wanted to sleep in his own bed and went back home), but they were all sprawled along the room, occupying every single spot near a couch or a cushion.

After hours of noise, the silence seemed strange, but natural either way. The only thing that could be heard was a paused, unsynchronized breathing. Sakura was asleep with her head in his lap, and he gave himself a moment to caress her hair a little, feeling his eyelids heavy. Then suddenly a door opened silently, and Naruto snapped out of his light nap to see the dark haired guy leave the house through the entrance door.

He left without even turning his head a little to give a look at them. What a dickhead. The sun rose, and Naruto fell asleep.

Naruto stretched out in bed, becoming very conscious of the light burning his eyelids, and groaned. He was so hungry he could die (and probably he woke up because of it), but he really, really, didn’t want to emerge from under the sheets. It was cold. He, as a summer person, had rights.

A couple hours after falling asleep in that guy’s house, Sakura woke him up and pulled him out to the street, alleging that she had a turn in the hospital later that morning and Naruto needed some quality sleep at home to get ready to work that night. And she was right, but damn, she didn’t give him the time to go to the bathroom before leaving, and Naruto spent all the way home too close to pissing himself on the pants. He loved Sakura with all his heart, but why was she so intense?

He breathed in and left his bed all of sudden, almost running to put some clothes on. He relaxed when he felt heat returning to his body, and then went to the kitchen, taking his phone to put some music on. Naruto didn’t live alone, but with his grandpa. He had been living on his own for some weeks, though, because Jiraiya’s work got him travelling a lot, so it was normal when he found nobody at home.

He sang softly to himself while crossing the kitchen to the fridge, and opened it as if something amazing and specially prepared for him was awaiting him inside. It didn’t happen, but it’d been nice. Then he remembered, hadn’t he agreed to have lunch with Sakura? What time was it? Oh, fuck.

Around twenty minutes later, Naruto had run all the way to the hospital and had miraculously arrived on time to meet Sakura at the cafeteria. She smiled brightly when she saw him, and he felt his mouth twist in an automatic smile.

“Sakura, what the fuck. Why don’t you have eyebags or something? What happened to your face?”, they went together to the menu’s queue, where some more people were waiting with empty trays.

Sakura shoved his shoulder slightly, smiling. “I’ve been able to survive a month of sleepless nights during exams. Bold of you to assume that this isn’t like a full night of sleep for me at this point”. Naruto grimaced, looking at her like the monster she was, or more like the monster med-school made of her.

They took their food and headed to an empty table, and Sakura told him about her day and took her time explaining some fresh-baked gross medic experiences. Naruto didn’t mind at all, his stomach was imperturbable when he was that hungry anyway, and hearing Sakura was just amazing.

After a while of warm conversation, the plates were half empty and the spirits, lifted. “So,” Naruto said, eyebrows arched. “Ino?”

And that was it. Sakura hadn’t managed to open her mouth and she was already furiously blushing, looking at her feet.

Naruto laughed, putting his hands on the edge of the table and looking at her with joy. “I knew it! Sakura, baby child, oh friend of mine, Sakura, you have to tell me!” He was SO excited. Sakura had been into Ino for an eternity, and the night before she was especially giggly, so he knew something had happened.

“Oh my god. Naruto, please lower your voice, for fuck’s sake” Sakura shot him a murderous look, and relaxed when he obeyed. Then she sighed, and didn’t look Naruto in the eye. “It was only a kiss”. Naruto felt like screaming.

But he didn’t, because he didn’t expect to die soon. Still, the scream must have been painted in his face, because Sakura smiled a little awkwardly. She looked so small with that face. He was so happy he felt like exploding.

“Please, Naruto, don’t make a big deal out of this”, Sakura sighed, frowning a little, “I haven’t even talked to her after that yet-”.

“But you have to!” Naruto let out. “You literally can’t miss this opportunity because I won’t let you”, Sakura smiled, with that I-expected-this look.

“Yeah, yeah, I know. But now let me eat, I’ll tell you the details another day. Today I’m too tired to emotionally combust”. That was fair, he supposed.

“Oh, Sakura”. She looked at him, expectant, with the fork still in hand. “Who was that guy you greeted yesterday? Hm, he was like, super pale. And his hair looked like a dead crow”. Sakura frowned a little and then suddenly looked like she was about to spill the food, but she managed to swallow somehow and laughed a little.

“What the heck, Naruto. You mean Sasuke?” Naruto agreed, remembering the name now that he’d heard it. “I met him some months ago, in another party, I think? I kept seeing him because he’s a regular patient here”.

That didn’t sound good. “Oh, is he okay?” Sakura looked up at him, downplaying it with a swing of her hand. “Don’t worry so much. I can’t tell you because of doctor’s confidentiality and all of that, but he just needs some meds and checks sometimes”.

Naruto left Sakura working and took a way back home that involved going near the beach, letting the sound of waves peace him. He could almost feel the fatigue settle in his shoulders and his eyelids. He had a few hours left before his shift at work, and was determined to spend them sleeping.

The sun was nowhere to be seen when Naruto arrived at the Red Moon.

Red Moon was a pub located in one of the best nighttime places he could think about: it was close to the bars young people usually went to get wasted, but slightly remote from the core of all of it, so it always had people but not too much. Well, except for the times when they held concerts in there, then it was crowded.

Naruto didn’t mind, though. He didn’t love the job, but he liked it enough to enjoy it, even if it killed his sleep schedule and his eardrums felt clogged after every concert. He preferred day over night, but he had a job that allowed him to talk with people all the time and watch them have fun, and that was good enough. He went down the stairs and took off his coat just after the door closed behind him, and then he started getting everything ready to open to the public.

It was already one in the morning when Sasuke appeared in the bar. Naruto didn’t see him arrive, so when he saw him with his dead-crow hair in a corner of the counter it was like he just materialized there. Since he was busy serving some shots to a very cheerful group of friends (and dancing while doing it since an incredible song was playing at the moment), it was his co-worker who attended him.

Naruto felt relief. After seeing how he looked at Sakura like she was a wall when they talked the night before, he wasn’t really interested in interacting with him. God, just the thought of it made his blood boil. But, on the other side… he was very curious. He understood the emo community was weird as fuck and they enjoyed being alone because they were all so special etcetera, but why would someone be in an university party one night and then the next absolutely alone in a bar? Even if he showed almost no interaction at said party. It was just weird.

He took a moment to look at him while cleaning some glasses, to that porcelain face he had illuminated with red lights, and then looked away. Whatever. He decided he was going to keep an eye on him for the night, just in case. The bad vibes he sensed the night before hadn’t gone away, and he had to stay there anyway. So, the rest of the night, he did his stuff and in the empty lapses of time between tasks, his eyes looked for that evil-crow boy.

For most of the time he just kept sitting there, in the corner he had made his own, sometimes looking at his phone, other times just looking nowhere. The amount of beer inside his jar kept going down steadily. He looked lonely, but not in a sad or vulnerable way. He was just lonely, in a way an old man would look while sitting on a bench and feeding pigeons (surely not a friendly old man but a grumpy one, though). It was when sharp eyes gazed at him when Naruto noticed he had been staring.

Naruto looked away as fast as he could and took the closest object between his hands in a desperate way to act as if nothing had happened, but he knew it was too late. “Fuck”, he gasped under his breath, with his sight heading the other direction.

Luckily, someone beckoned to him from the opposite end of the counter, so he had an excuse to move. He prepared the drink he was told, still tense. He was so nervous, and what got him annoyed was that he didn’t even have a reason to be. But fuck, he was so uncomfortable he couldn’t stop moving.

That wasn’t an unknown feeling, though. Every time he got caught in situations like that he became a mess. Also, it wasn’t his fault! If that guy wasn’t so suspicious, Naruto wouldn’t have to check on him, to begin with. Why the fuck was he friends with Sakura? He knew Sakura had had an awful taste in men before discovering she was a lesbian, but he thought the era of Sakura choosing bad male companions had passed. Not likely, it seemed.

Maybe ten minutes after that, Naruto saw him talking to some girl. There was it, that sided smirk, attacking again. Not long after that they were walking towards the toilets. Naruto groaned loudly, his voice almost muted by the music. He was the one that had to clean the bathrooms after that kind of stuff. Still, he was almost an angel and he had promised himself long ago that he wouldn’t be the one interfering in the pub toilets business. What happened in the toilets remained in the toilets, and then when the bar closed, the bleach would do the Lord’s work and erase all the evidence.

Naruto tried to forget about it, and kept cleaning the counter periodically, serving beer jars and laughing with friendly clients. The uneasy feeling got away bit by bit, as Sasuke remained more time out of his sight.

When he attended all the customers a while after, he took a quick glance, looking for someone who may need him, and he saw a girl standing alone at the counter. Naruto went to her, but she looked… disoriented?

“Hey miss, you feeling alright?” he asked, wearing his most reliable smile. She looked at him with narrowed eyes, and he froze. She was the girl who was talking to Sasuke earlier.

“Yeah, sorry, I just feel a bit dizzy” she said, voice almost unhearable under the music. At least it was already late night, so the local wasn’t as crowded as it was during midnight.

Naruto filled a glass with water and handed it to her. “Here. Are you sure everything is okay? I can call a taxi for you if you need” he didn’t know what to think of that situation. She didn’t look hurt but she surely wasn’t okay. And where the fuck was that Sasuke?

“Did that guy do anything?” Naruto asked, cautiously and trying to stay calm. He was more worried than anything else.

The girl blushed, but then shook her head. “No, really, I’m okay. Thank you so much”, then, just like that, she walked away. And the evil crow-hair guy was nowhere to be seen.

He kept thinking about that until the end of his shift, when he was taking his coat in order to go home. At first he thought he’d be angry, but he was so confused. That girl didn’t look hurt, but something felt wrong on so many levels he couldn’t describe it. He closed the door after him and headed home under a moonless sky, shivering a little when a cold breeze stroked him.

He was definitely going to tell Sakura in the morning.


	2. the drum (car seat headrest)

_He's got it all  
He's got it figured out  
Dream in the hall  
Back in the hospital  
I'm not concerned  
He'll get it straight this time  
And if he doesn't, fuck it  
_

Oh, not only Sakura was going to kill Sasuke, no. She was going to destroy him.

She had woken up that morning feeling like that day was hers. Almost eight hours of non-stop sleeping, a ray of sunlight comfortably resting on top of her bed and illuminating the whole room, and the only pressure of having to go grocery shopping during the morning. She had to be in the hospital later that evening, but just because Tsunade wanted to show her something. So it wasn’t _work_.

If only she hadn’t read the message Naruto had sent her the night before.

[4:03] sakuraaa a a  
[4:03] today happend smth super weird  
[4:04] your emo friedn from the party came to red moon  
[4:05] he came a l o n e  
[4:05] but thats not the weird thing  
[4:05] he was with a girl and they went to the toilets and the girl came out alon e and super disoriented?  
[4:06] i mean he didnt even come out w her what kind of dumbshit does that  
[4:06] i talked to her but she didnt say a thing and just went home  
[4:06] BUT THE IMPORTANT THING IS HOW DID HE LEAVE WITHOUT ME NOTICING  
[4:06] not only me but?? the GIRL?  
[4:10] sakura i trust u you know that but why the f are you friends w a 2014 emo that is ALSO a moron  
[4:10] i wish you're having the best sleep of ur life rn good night you're the best !!!

Still, she was able to have a peaceful morning, but a feeling of uneasiness had come and didn’t leave, so the amazing expectations of the day had deflated. She replied to Naruto with neutral answers and left the phone for the morning after sending a message to Sasuke. Not that she was expecting an answer, though. Sasuke was the king of leaving someone on read, as she had confirmed other times, but she didn’t care as long as he read the conversation. And she knew he did.

And so was she, wearing her white coat, walking through one of the exit corridors of the hospital to meet the idiot in one of the back doors of the building. She hadn’t finished all of her tasks there, but she had a short free time and that conversation wouldn’t last long. They never did when Sasuke was involved. When she got out, the sun was already nowhere to be seen. It was winter, after all; short days, long nights. As expected, he was already there, resting his back on the wall of the building. She shivered a little, as the temperature changed suddenly when going through the door.

They were the only ones out there, but the sounds of the city could be heard clearly. “There you are,” Sakura said, and automatically frowned. Sasuke lifted his eyes, meeting hers, and then went down to the plastic bag she was holding. “No, don’t look at me like that. Today we need to talk”.

“Talk about what?” he responded, absolutely uninterested, looking down to his feet again and arching his eyebrows. Why was he so mean all the time? Gosh.

“You’re not being careful enough, Sasuke. Yesterday a friend of mine saw you and told me right after”. He looked at Sakura, then, a spark of something in his eyes. Something illegible, though. “Are you fucking stupid? One thing is doing it, another very different thing is being almost _shameless_ about it.” Sakura felt her blood boiling, she was so angry at him. But she knew that anger came from being _worried_ , in the first place. Fuck, Sasuke was a grown up man, she shouldn’t had to be acting like his _mother_ at this point.

Sasuke stayed silent for a few seconds. “It wasn’t that obvious. Why did that friend of yours even know me?”, he responded, distant, almost emotionless.

She sighed. “He saw you at the party the other day”.

Sasuke humed in comprehension. “Are we done?” Then looked at her, with his arms crossed. He was obviously getting annoyed, but she really couldn’t understand how he was so calm about it.

Why did talking to him have to be so difficult? Sakura sighed again, and let her arms release tension by allowing them to fall flat on the sides of her body. She knew the conversation was over, and she felt helpless and angry and _bad_. “I thought you weren’t doing that anymore”. Her words sounded disappointed, but mostly resigned. She knew Sasuke wouldn’t be affected by her disappointment, but she couldn’t help feeling that way.

Sakura handed the bag in to Sasuke, not feeling the strength to look him in the eye.

“That’s none of your business”, he said. But this time, his voice sounded softer than before. That surely was his messy way of acknowledging her concern and telling her not to worry about him.

Oh, to be in a world in which Uchiha Sasuke knew how to express emotions without being a dick.

She smiled a little. “Well, it kind of is, you know”. She looked up, and spent a second appreciating the details.

Sasuke was so unreadable. His looks were always so neutral, his face, the same. Sakura could have sworn she had seen him with that hoodie half of the times they had met, it was like he didn't change at all from one time to the next. He just changed from sloppy outfit to night-pub outfit.

"No, it's not", he deadpanned. Then he walked away, taking his time, and Sakura clenched her fist and watched him go until he hid around the corner.

It was always like that. When she thought maybe, that time, she would be able to get a little closer to Sasuke’s mind, he put her off. At the end of the day she had no other option besides helping the only way she could, but she wanted to do _more_.

That emo little shit was going to be the reason for her headaches for so long she didn’t want to think about it.

She took out her phone and texted Naruto.

[20:47] Don’t worry about him, naruto. I talked to him and nothing serious happened  
[20:47] i think he met someone he knew and she left while sasuke was talking to his friend  
[20:48] maybe she was feeling sick after drinking or something

If she had believed in God, she would have prayed for Naruto not to get annoying about this. She really, really, didn’t want to be in charge of two children in their twenties. Except she already was. One of them was living his edgy phase, the other one was an hyperactive mess, and that situation left her as a single mother with night shifts at work.

She sighed, and came back inside the building, hiding her hands inside the flower embroidered pockets of her coat. Tsunade was probably already waiting for her.

That night the sky was clear, and the moon was smiling in crescent. Sasuke had been wandering around the city for several hours, with no place in mind. It felt like the steps he had walked were the same as always, as if he had repeated the same trajectories over and over, and maybe that wasn’t wrong. Still, he kept walking in silence.

It was past midnight when he arrived at the Red Moon.

He sighed, looking right at the neon light which signaled the entrance. Two weeks more or less had passed since Sakura had tried her intervention concerning the last time he was there. He frowned, and decided not to think about it, and then went down the stairs and entered the pub. He had no intention of repeating the experience, anyway.

The ambience was loud, but not a crowded kind of loud, and soft red light illuminated the places where people were sitting in small groups. A song, probably _The Strokes’_ , was playing and filling the air, and some voices could be heard over the music. It was not annoying, though.

Sasuke did the usual. He took his coat off, asked for a drink, found a distant place to sit and stayed there. Watching people. Listening to foreign conversations he wasn’t invited to participate in. And that was okay, that was kind of reassuring.

Except.

“Oh!” a voice cried out behind him, with a dramatic tone difficult to ignore. “Are my eyes lying? Isn’t this Itachi’s little brother?” Sasuke frowned, cursing his luck and feeling his body react to the name of his brother. He turned around, knowing whose eyes his gaze would be meeting.

Blond, long hair gathered up in a ponytail, punk clothes and that disgusting aura only male art students and problematic children emitted. “Deidara” he sighed, wearing his most neutral but slightly disgusted mask. “What do you want?”

Deidara looked at him and smiled while moving away from a stool to take a seat next to him.

The conversation was brief and mostly unsubstantial regarding its content. The blond said hello, dropped some bad taste puns, and mentioned Itachi and how all Uchihas were unpleasant a few times. Sasuke wasn’t interested at all, and didn’t say anything most of the time. The moment Deidara got lost, he was left not only feeling tired, but also bad tempered, and with a new nervousness settled inside his head.

The fact that Deidara was there implied things. First of all, it implied Itachi would be knowing about him soon. Not only Itachi, but the whole community, because Deidara didn’t know how to shut the fuck up. Was Deidara alone, or were the others also around? Itachi was the least to be worried about, since he usually respected when Sasuke didn’t want to see his face. However, the others were not so benevolent.

Itachi had become a banned name in his mind a long time ago, and the only mention of it made him go berserk. He had thought that the continent was big enough to avoid every contact with Akatsuki members, but it looked like he had been naive about it. They would never become an easy group to avoid.

His feet bumping against the floor under the counter, Sasuke started getting more and more tense. He looked around in a desperate attempt to calm down, but it was useless. He had made such an effort to get away from everything Akatsuki meant, and it had ended up not being enough. They were always around.

Due to the increasing anxiety he was feeling, the smartest thing to do would have been going back home, but he knew what would happen then. He couldn’t sleep, and he would only get worse feeling locked up between four walls. Fuck, he was getting so stressed and so _hungry_. A need had appeared in the bottom of his stomach and was eating him alive from the inside, crawling up like a lizard on a wall.

He breathed out slowly, fixing his sight in a lost point between the arranged bottles beyond the counter, right before following the movement of the person on the other side of it. The barman had blond spiky hair, just long enough to have it tied up in a messy bun, and his eyes looked fatigued, but clear. They stood out under a layer of eyeshadow, which shone when he moved to the rhythm of some song that was playing in the background. He was singing it to himself while cleaning some glasses, and even if he looked tired, he also looked _vibrant_.

Sasuke sticked his eyes on him, and breathed in.

He decided one last caprice wouldn’t hurt.

Naruto was feeling great. That day, he had woken up with the feeling of being able to conquer the world. He sang every song in his playlist, danced to the music that was playing in the supermarket when he had gone grocery shopping, smiled at every kid in a baby buggy he had met in the street.

The sensation didn’t fade when he went to work, feeling ultra confident, and started talking lively with some early-night (or late-evening) clients. It was a regular working day, so at two in the morning he’d probably be asleep, and that was just _so_ nice to think about. Still, it was one of those days work was entertaining to do, one of those days he talked with everyone just because he could and he wanted, and not because he had to give a good image as a worker.

His mood didn’t change when the evil-crow boy entered the Red Moon. He was surprised to find him there, though. Naruto hadn’t thought a lot about what happened last time he saw him, since Sakura’s texts had calmed him enough. However, the fact that her friend was an asshole remained intact.

Another fact that hadn’t changed was that he _lost_ against him last time. Not that they had any contact, but he just _knew_. He felt vulnerable when the other guy had caught him staring, and that was not going to happen again. Not in this house. That was _his domain_ , and that guy was going to receive _zero_ attention. He was going to ignore him the whole night.

_“Not only that”_ , Naruto thought, smiling to himself while fastly setting lemon slices in some tequila shots he was preparing. The client insisted on inviting him to one, and he didn’t say no. That day was a good day, he could have that. “ _If someone’s gotta be looking, it’s going to be_ him”.

He did his best tricks, the ones he used when some beautiful individual came in sight. Not to conquer anyone (because to be honest, he didn’t think that would be so easy), but to enjoy the moment of creating his own movies in his head and pass the time. And fuck it, because it looked cool. Yes, he was thinking about cocktail-preparing abilities, or more like juggling around with the aluminium container to prepare them.

He started being extra as fast as someone asked for a Bloody Mary. A second later, the countdown had started. He put the vodka, the tomato juice, squeezed a lime and started shaking, shaking, shaking the bottle in a record time. It only took a flash of ice and pepper and it was ready to serve. The guy who’d asked for it and his friends looked impressed, and started clapping. He laughed, exaggerating a reverence, and looked for Sasuke with the corner of his eye.

He discovered he was talking (more like arguing) with some blond guy, and pouted. That was okay, he supposed. Not that he was craving for attention or anything, right? He was just in a good mood and wanted to beat his ass. On his mind, at least.

He prepared a drink for himself and looked around. The ones who asked for the drink were not the last people in the local, but almost. It was already past midnight, and during working days they closed at one in the morning, therefore the ambience was peaceful compared to weekends. His coworker was cleaning some tables and taking off empty glasses, so he was left alone in the counter, cleaning some stuff, dancing to the music in the background. His head felt light thanks to the alcohol, his fingertips tingling.

Then he felt a pair of eyes nearly piercing his nape.

Naruto felt confused for a second, an additional second he spent passing the cloth over an already clean glass. Was it him, looking directly like that? Was that even _legal,_ or was it just a very awkward move to ask for another drink without raising his voice? Alright, he didn’t care, he just wasn’t expecting it.

He put the glass aside, put a smile that felt natural in his lips and leant over the counter in front of the evil-crow boy. “Hey! Need something?” he asked, friendly.

That was actually the first time he had seen him eye to eye. The boy had angular features, but something in his face made it look soft either way. His hair reached his shoulders and was weirdly cut, locks falling in both sides of his face and non uniform bangs right up his brows. And his eyes. His eyes were so dark no difference between the pupil and the iris could be found. Or maybe that was because of the light, who knew.

“I was thinking about buying you a drink”, a soft, low voice said, black eyes looking at him.

Wait.

What the _fuck_.

“Eh?” he blurted, having zero control of his mind or mouth at the moment. “I can’t do that. I work here”, oh my fucking god just why in the world wasn’t any brain cell handling that situation properly. Like, he had been drinking some minutes ago, that was such a poor excuse he wanted to _cry_. All because he didn't expect that.

Sasuke arched a brow, but didn’t seem annoyed. Not only that, he looked even slightly amused. “I see there’s a lot of people demanding your service right now", he said, and Naruto gave himself a moment to look around. The last loud group of people had already left, and besides them, there were only a few couples in the whole local. He saw his coworker, cleaning tables, and knew he was already in the mood of going to sleep.

That actually soothed him. There weren't any more clients around, and he could use another beer before going back home. That was going to be his passing-from-tipsy-to-drunk beer, he decided. “Alright. But if in some spectacular show of bad luck I get fired for this, you owe me more than a drink”, he said.

Now that a decision had been made, it was the time to calm down and be _cool_ about it. Maybe Sasuke was a dickhead, but if Sakura defended him, he couldn’t be that bad. Or at least, not bad enough to not have a drink with him. He served himself a beer and used the movement of his hands to release tension, then put another one in front of the other guy, smiling slightly. “The name’s Naruto.”

“Sasuke”, he replied, and took a sip of the beer while smiling slightly. “Naruto’s a weird name”.

Naruto’s smile widened, showing clear teeth. “Yeah, my parents named me after a book. I don’t even think it’s a real name, but that makes it cooler!”

“Hm. It suits you”.

The conversation flowed easier than Naruto would have expected. Sasuke didn’t talk a lot, but always made sure he knew he was listening and replied every time it was needed, with an interested glance in his eyes. Naruto didn’t mention Sakura, so they were, in theory, just two absolute strangers sharing a beer and having empty conversations.

He started feeling clumsier and his laugh appeared more often as he emptied out the beer slowly, forgetting for a while that he was supposed to be working. Not that he was needed at the moment, anyway.

He wasn’t oblivious enough to not notice the long gazes the other boy was shooting at him, though. And that had put the game on again, a game that wasn’t only inside his head; and he wasn’t going to lose at that either.

“So”, he said, while sitting on the counter. He passed his legs to the other side, letting them fall near Sasuke, shortening the distance between them, “wanna tell me how is it that you’re here alone on a working day, drinking with a barman? That’s kind of sad, y’know”.

He looked surprised for a moment, but then smiled. Then he raised the bet, letting a hand fall effortlessly on Naruto’s thigh. Naruto let it be, and closed his eyes for a second to let his head breath, if that made any sense.

“I was passing by and found something that made me stay”, Sasuke purred, eyes blinking, but still looking at him.

There was…. a _something_ in them. Naruto found himself looking at his eyes astonished, but couldn’t find what was that left him feeling so vulnerable. Then he looked away and reminded the whole context.

Okay, Sasuke was hot, he could admit that. Something in his mind was screaming “remember the bad vibes he gives you”, and he could hear it clearly. But like, he also could willingly ignore it.

He wasn’t super drunk, but his head felt funny, and his body temperature was higher than usual, aside from the heavy air inside the room. Therefore, he was drunk enough to put the blame on the alcohol if that situation got out of hand.

“And what is that something?”, he responded, tempting. _What was he even saying at that point_.

Sasuke smiled again, bending his head a little and showing off his neck in Naruto’s direction. He shivered. “Maybe we should get out of here if you really want to know”.

Naruto breathed in deeply. The line between the want to beat the other guy in whatever proud-flirting game he had invented and the want to have sex with him was becoming dangerously thin.

After a short silence, he took his phone out and checked the hour. It was already closure time. Fuck it. “Okay, I get it” Naruto said, “gimme ten minutes to get everything ready down here and we’ll be off”.

His stomach felt uneasy while he got everything ready. All his movements were almost automatic, as if he wasn’t really in charge inside his own body. He said goodbye to his coworker, who blinked at him.

Sasuke was standing next to the door when he finished what was left to do, and it took him just a look to start walking out. Naruto followed him up the stairs, guided by inertia and thinking about what was next while putting his coat on. He could feel his body vibrate, and his head was cloudy.

Cold assaulted him suddenly, leaving him no room to breathe. The moon was up in the sky, a freezing, almost invisible haze covering the floor. The streets were silent and illuminated only by street lamps and some business' lights. He saw Sasuke by the corner of his eye walking around the next corner, which was two buildings from the stairs, and followed him. “Eh! Wait for me. So, what’s the pla-”.

Then there was movement and his back fell hard against a wall, dark eyes fixed on his own, an arm pinned to the wall next to his head. Naruto felt dizzy and like fainting, but probably that last part wasn’t because of the drink.

He felt confused for a moment, because that had been: wow. It was like he hadn’t been able to follow Sasuke’s movements, so he was there and a moment later he was- against a wall. He was against a wall. He was _being pinned_ against a wall by that amazingly handsome guy.

Maybe it was cold, but his body was about to boil and disappear in a cloud of steam, making himself become one with the haze that covered the streets. It had been easy to be casual when they were still in the pub, but now he could almost feel nervousness filling his limbs like a liquid, flooding everything it touched. He felt his fingers stretch, not having found a place to rest. _“Oh my f-”_ he didn’t have the time to finish the thought.

Lips were pushing over his, greedy for anything he could offer. Naruto’s head was spinning. He really had the sense of every movement being extremely fast, and barely managed to reciprocate the kiss properly. Still, the commotion was such that he actually forgot they were in the street, in an alley close to his workplace. He didn't know how that was going to end, but he didn’t think of it anymore. It didn't matter at the moment. His hands dropped to the strip of Sasuke’s pants, slipping through his coat.

Hands on his waist, Sasuke broke the kiss as his lips descended to his jaw, then his neck. He was acting so wild it had caught Naruto off guard, but like, not that he was going to complain. He was good about rolling with it. He shivered when lips brushed his neck, and let his nails dig in skin a little, feeling tension building up in his chest, and how skin was becoming sensitive at every touch.

Then there was a small bite, tempting. He allowed himself to sigh, and smiled, content, when Sasuke’s mouth opened against his skin.

Then something sharp pierced his neck.

Naruto screamed and his eyes opened suddenly, and he pushed Sasuke out, putting his hands between them. The dream-like sensation disappeared, and his neck hurted like _hell_. “Hey hey hey! What the fuck, dude! That hurted, oh my god-” He winced and took one hand to his neck, where he felt something sticky. When he looked at them, his fingers were blood stained.

He stopped complaining, his sight fell flat on the floorboards. He was bleeding and it wasn’t just a little. His body literally didn’t know how to respond, adrenaline rushing through his veins for a complete different reason a second ago.

He looked at Sasuke for the first time and he found him a couple steps from him, with a confused, wild look on his face, lips red and half parted. He looked so confused that Naruto thought for a second that maybe what had just happened had been involuntary, but when he gave it a second though, that was simply _ridiculous_.

“Are you gonna fucking tell me why did you do that?” he screamed again, his hand pressing his neck in a desperate way to make the hemorrhage stop. Sasuke kept looking at him like he was a ghost, eyes frozen on him.

Then, Naruto realized. He had fangs. Like, larger than average fangs.

That couldn’t be it.

“You shouldn’t be awake” Sasuke whispered, stunned, like it was a message for himself. Then he blinked a couple of times, and inhaled and exhaled slowly. When he looked at Naruto again, he didn’t look frozen anymore. Not that he was relieved because of that, because he looked hell worried.

“Oh my fucking god.” Naruto said slowly, forgetting for a moment about his neck and just focusing on going insane. He had _fangs_ and he had _bit_ him. _Hotel Transylvania_ had taught him that could only be one thing. “Are you Dracula?”

Sasuke grimaced, like he couldn’t believe he was having that conversation. “Vampire, if you want. Not Dracula.” The Sasuke from a few minutes ago had vanished, leaving an ice statue of his previous version, which was more likely the version of him he had seen at the party, when he first saw him talking with Sakura.

“Okay, okay, vampire. Oh wow, okay. This is fine. Everything is fine” Naruto laughed and repeated that to himself, his voice unstable. Not only his voice, but also his brain. Everything inside him was on fire. Or frozen. “Well, I see neither of us likes this situation so, if you could take my phone and call Sakura it would be great, you know?”

So, this guy was a vampire. Sakura’s friend. And he had tried to drink his blood. Why wasn’t he dead? Or something?

“How are you doing that?” Sasuke mumbled. And that sounded like a threat. When Naruto lifted his gaze, he confronted a pair of intense red eyes piercing his skull. He moved away to the end of the alley, wary. It wasn’t the strangest thing in the whole situation, but they looked unnatural enough to make him question himself if that was just a dream. It was unlikely that the hurt of his neck was imaginary, though.

“Doing what? You’re the one who did something here. I’m literally _bleeding out_ and you’re just standing there!” he replied, taking screaming as the least bad coping mechanism at the moment. “And what's with those eyes of yours?”

“You can see them” he said, and he looked serious for a moment, but then his eyes turned black again and his face went pale as snow. That reaction was the closest to a mental breakdown you can expect to see in a block of ice.

Naruto was starting to freak out. He couldn't see his wound, but the hand in his neck was warm and he was starting to feel dizzy. He heard once that alcohol made the blood more liquid, and that wasn't the best thought he could be having at the moment. “Uh, dude? Can you not forget about this and call Sakura? I really don’t want to die.”

The other sighed and looked him in the eye, this time just extremely tired. “You’re not dying. It wasn’t that bad”.

Naruto took his hand off his neck and saw the bleeding was less dramatic than before. His hand was covered in blood though, so the sight of it made him become a few tones paler. Sasuke frowned, thinking, as if Naruto wasn’t there and there wasn’t _blood_. “Wait. You came with me on purpose?”

Naruto looked at him, not understanding a thing. “Uh. Yeah? You didn’t draw a gun on me to make out with you.”

“Are you telling me someone talks literally half an hour to you and you just go and say ‘yeah let’s fuck’?”

He blushed, feeling confused for being attacked like that out of nowhere. “You’re the one who came to me flirting! Why is it my fault for rolling with it?!”

Sasuke set a clearly disgusted face. That was it, he was going to beat him up- “Usually, I only need a few phrases to… uh, hypnotise someone. It wasn’t supposed to be flirting, but a cover” he replied, serious, but then a laugh-like sound blurted out of his mouth. A _laugh_. ”But you freely fell for it.”

Naruto stared for a second with his mouth part opened, and felt his face go red. “This- this whole situation should be illegal. You can’t, and I mean can’t, aren’t allowed to, just come to me, HIT ON ME, be a fucking VAMPIRE and then just laugh at me after you BITE ME” he pointed his chest, still embarrassed, but blaming everything on the fucking Dracula. “You haven’t been able to hypnotise me so maybe you’re not in the right place to laugh, huh?"

Sasuke wasn’t imperturbable anymore, as he frowned and looked at him as if he was talking to an ant. Naruto felt small, but didn't stop looking at him with anger. “You dickhead, maybe I couldn’t hypnotise you because you’re so fucking stupid I didn’t even need to. Shut up or you’re dead”. His tone wasn’t serious enough for him to be scared, but better not to play around, just in case. He just groaned, disgusted.

Was he really a vampire? Like, that implied vampires _existed_ , and he didn’t want to live in a world in which vampires existed. He hadn’t really thought about it, and the idea of it was making him feel uneasy.

He groaned again, looking at his hand. After the adrenaline burst, the turn-on and the alcohol were absolutely gone, there was only tiredness left. His neck didn’t hurt a lot at the moment, and he wasn’t bleeding so much already, but he was still worried about it. Then he remembered all the vampire movies. His skin went three tones paler. “Sasuke” he murmured, looking at the other boy, “am I becoming a vampire now?”

He had never seen anyone roll their eyes so hard. “I’m not a zombie”, he deadpanned. “Call Sakura”. Sasuke looked at him with an indecipherable face, and sighed. “I’ll unfortunately see you around”. And just like that, he walked out the alley.

When he got lost around the corner, Naruto felt his lungs fill with air as if he had been holding his breath all that time. Normally he would have needed a lot of convincing to believe that vampires were real, but after that bite he didn't know if he had any reason to doubt it.

He called Sakura, told her where he was as fast as possible and just stared at the wall in front of him, not focusing his sight on anything. He was exhausted, and confused, and scared, and angry. He wanted to scream, because that wasn’t fair. He didn’t deserve to be the target of a vampire and, on top of that, being that vampire a fucking idiot.

Naruto sighed, feeling his body deflate as he sat on the edge of the sidewalk. That had been the most intense make out session in his whole life and he surely didn’t want to repeat it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'll be trying to add a new chapter every two weeks !! I'm starting my last year of uni next week so that may change, but well. I'll do my best anyway, wish me luck !
> 
> Also, here's the playlist for the fic ! I'll keep editing it as the fic goes on, hope you enjoy it!  
> https://open.spotify.com/playlist/2UKaVNftiufwQGH35h3cyS?si=LXDZLNcSS4y2ZkFw4DU-Hw


	3. small cuts (the brobecks)

_Goodnight  
Sleep tight  
Don't let anyone bite  
She will leave you deaf and bewildered.  
Oh how she floats like a butterfly  
Stings like a killer.  
_

The night before, Sakura had come to pick him up, and despite that Naruto had thought that it would happen to be a lot of screaming or freaking out, neither of them could find the words for any of that. She had checked the wound in his neck in silence, under the light of her cellphone while sitting in the sidewalk, only to find it had already healed on its own. She didn't seem surprised.

After that, Sakura had taken him to her apartment, and they both had let their bodies fall heavy against the double bed, only moving to put themselves under the blankets.

Naruto couldn’t sleep. The events of that night were on loop inside his brain, refusing to let go the image of large fangs, blood in his hands and red, deep, piercing eyes. His head looked like a Tumblr page of a thirteen years old who had just discovered _Twilight_ and it was ridiculous but it was _real_ , and that made it indefinitely worse.

Everything had happened so fast he hadn’t even had time to fear seriously for his life, but now, thinking about it some hours later, it was serious business he had gotten himself into. Vampires were real, and one of them knew about him knowing. He was trying so, so hard to convince himself that he wasn’t scared. And he wasn’t scared of Sasuke, at least, because he was a fucking moron who had looked as astonished as him, but who else would have his same condition? And why the heck had Sasuke looked so threatened by him?

Suddenly, he could feel green, big eyes staring at him, only illuminated by the street light from the window, and turned his head in the dark to see a tired, worried Sakura.

“I’m sorry for not telling you sooner”, she whispered, so low he could have imagined it.

Naruto frowned, and shook his head slightly. “In what world would telling me about the existence of fucking vampires be a good idea?” he joked, feeling the attempt to soften the conversation dry in his throat, as he couldn't make himself to smile properly. Saying it out loud was weird. Nothing about anything that had happened was normal.

Sakura saw this, and opened her arms in response. Naruto moved towards her immediately, and rested his head in the crook of her neck. He felt her arms tug him close around his back, and did the same when his hands landed in her waist. He sighed, feeling his body relax at the comforting smell of his friend and the comfortable posture.

Being with her felt like home, and after all the recent weirdness around him, that sense of familiarity was the anchor he needed. They kept like that until he couldn’t count the minutes anymore, only listening to Sakura’s breathing and the distant sound of traffic out in the streets.

He finally changed the pace of his breathing to a slower one and found his sleep.

He woke up to an empty bed, and let a few seconds pass to remember why he was at Sakura's. The events of the night before hit him like a truck, so it wasn't hard to be fully awake in a second. He groaned against the pillow and immediately pulled himself out of under the blankets, and pressed his lips in a thin line when he felt the headache arrive. In addition, he had fallen asleep without taking off his clothes nor his makeup.

He smelled like sweat and alcohol, his eyes were irritated, his head was threatening to kill him, his mouth tasted bad and he had to look like a fucking panda. Perfect.

Naruto sighed and went out of the bedroom, only to hear the melodious sound of a frying pan doing his job. He frowned. Shouldn't Sakura be at work? What time was it?

He followed the sound and found Sakura in the kitchen, a big tie-dye hoodie on and wet hair hitting her shoulders. She turned around to look at him from the stove, and smiled just a second before frowning. "Fuck, Naruto, you look like shit".

"I also feel like shit, it shouldn't be possible to look and feel shitty at the same time", he whined, leaning in the frame door. She laughed slightly.

"Go take a shower, I'm making pancakes", she said, while turning her back on him to face the pan again. "There's a makeup remover in the cabinet above the sink. Take one of these big hoodies from the closet, they should suit you".

"Alright", he smiled, looking at her with tired eyes, "but shouldn't you be at the hospital? It's pretty late already".

"Ah, I took the day off", Naruto opened the mouth to protest, but she shot him a glance before he could say a word. "Sh, don't. Don't fucking dare to tell me that my best friend being bit by a vampire isn't a good reason to skip work for a single day. They owe me free days anyway".

Naruto smiled sincerely, looking with bright eyes at her friend. He loved her _so much_. “Sakura, you're the best“. He approached her from behind to give her a big, bone crushing hug. A soft giggle started bubbling from her mouth as she tried to get rid of him, spatula still in hand.

"Naruto! You smell _bad_ , go take that shower, for god's sake!"

He pulled away fastly and articulated some "okay, okay" while getting lost through the door.

The warm water let his mind slip away for a few minutes, only to return with the same problems as before, but not so panicked about them. He had so many questions, some of them for Sakura, but others for Sasuke.

He wasn't precisely keen on seeing him again, but as he had said, it was unavoidable. And Sakura, how did she know about him, and for how long had she known? Was she another victim? He felt his blood rush cold at the thought of Sakura being assaulted like he had been. Either way, he would ask Sakura later. At least she looked okay and non surprised about the whole issue, and he trusted her, so it couldn't be that bad, right? And if Sasuke had harmed her, there would be no fangs that could protect him from Naruto.

Ten minutes later, he was sitting at the kitchen table with Sakura, ready to have the most amazing breakfast ever. It was almost noon, but as if none of them cared. A soft melody played on the radio and daylight illuminated the room, everything felt warm and cozy despite the winter cold.

"How did you meet Sasuke, Sakura?" he asked, only to put almost a whole pancake in his mouth a second after. He chewed, content, closing his eyes.

Sakura laughed at the sight of him, covering her mouth with a hand. "It was a year ago or so, I think? Hm", she lifted up the fork, moving it around while she thought, "Tsunade introduced me to him. I’ve been helping him with some stuff since then”.

“Some stuff?”

She winced, using an extra second to look around the plate beside her, probably considering if she should tell him. Then her eyes met his again, and she spoke. “Blood. So he doesn’t have to take it by himself”.

Naruto’s eyes shot wide open, and moved away the chair, preparing to stand up. “Sakura, what the fuck? You let him _drink_ from you? I’m gonna fucking kill him-”.

“No no no! Naruto, oh my God, no. Blood from the hospital, not from _me_ ”.

“Oh”. Naruto sat again, relief flooding inside him. “I guess… that actually makes sense? By blood you mean, from storage or something?”

“Yeah. It’s not very legal, but Tsunade is the one who told me to, and she’s the boss, so. It’s not very dramatic because he doesn’t need a lot of blood, and I usually give him the ones from the most common blood types” she shifted in her chair, taking her mug. “I believe it’s the right thing to do. I don’t know, it’s complicated.”

“Hm. Attacking me last night when he didn’t have to… it only makes him more of an asshole.” Naruto said, pouting. ”Fuck, this is still unrealistic to talk about! I hate this”, he complained, his knee bouncing under the table, while his other foot rested on the chair in a kind of comfortable (but weird) way of sitting.

She laughed, nervous, against the cup in her lips. “It is, right? I still can’t believe he attacked _you_ , of everyone in the fucking city”. Sakura looked… worried? Uncomfortable? He didn’t know, but whatever it was, it was comprehensible. All that shit was crazy enough to have both of them feeling _wrong_ about it.

“And have you met more of them? Are you some kind of vampire feeder?” he gulped down another pancake and his eyes shot open. “Oh my God, is the hospital some kind of vampire lunchroom?”

Sakura coughed, caught by surprise. “Naruto! No! It’s only him” she sighed, and rested her chin on her hand, her left elbow solid on the table. “Sometimes he asks for more, though. I think he gives it to someone, but who knows. I barely know him, he’s kinda unapproachable”.

He sighed, and pulled apart his plate. “I figured that much”. Naruto groaned, and shuffled his hair. “Okay, but what now? I know about him. Do you know if I’m in danger or something? Is a group of vampires in black capes going to come for me to protect their secret? I mean, I’m sure I can punch some of them, but not if they’re more than three-.”

“Nah, don’t worry about that. I’d be dead by now if that was the case.”

“But maybe you are under Tsunade’s protection or something? By the way, how does she even know about vamp-?”

“I said not to worry, Naruto” she deadpanned, serious, and Naruto closed his mouth.

He knew he was rambling, but if he didn’t speak out loud, that rambling would still go on in his head. He was scared and he would admit it, but that wasn’t the most difficult thing to cope with. It was the tension, the awareness that he has stepped into something dangerous without zero information about it.

Sakura recognised his struggle and shot him a glance with pitiful eyes. Hell. “Anyway,” she said, “you’re staying here today. Tonight we’re meeting Sasuke”.

“Uh?”, he said, his hand going to cover his neck instinctively. He couldn’t feel even a single bruise left. Weird.

His friend stood up from her chair, plate in hand, and put the other hand on his shoulder. “Seriously, don’t worry about it. You’ve met him in the worst of all possible circumstances, but he’s just a mean emo jerk”.

He laughed while Sakura was leaving her things in the sink. “He definitely is! Do you think being emo is a requirement if you’re a vampire? Like, some kind of uniform? That would explain the classic aesthetic”.

She looked at him with arched brows. “Pfft, maybe they rise from their tomb at night while playing _Welcome to the Black Parade_ ”.

Naruto giggled and finished his tea in a sip.

“Ah, Naruto. He’ll arrive at six or so, so you decide the plan ‘til then. I say”, she made a dramatic pause, gazing at him, “we watch _Sharknado_ ”.

“Oh, yes, baby! You know how to treat a man” Naruto shouted, articulating a big smile. “Part 2?”

Sakura laughed. “Part 2”.

A knock on the door and suddenly Sakura was on her feet, hurrying to approach the entrance of her apartment.

They had been chilling the whole day, just laying around, eating crap and watching shitty movies. _Sharknado 2_ had been only the beginning (a strong, meaningful beginning) and they had ended watching _High School Musical_ and singing along almost every song, not caring about getting the couch dirty with popcorn or disturbing the neighbours.

Naruto was feeling better than it was to be expected, since he was having fun, and fuck, he couldn’t remember when was the last time he had spent that much time with Sakura. Her home was his second home as well, and he found the comfort he needed in the mess they’d made of it during the last hours, the smell of roses air freshener all over the place and the warm, sunken sofa. But when he thought about it, not _remembering_ about it but actively _thinking_ of it, he could feel in his belly this... uneasiness.

At the end of the day, it was pretty easy to forget about what was worrying him if he pretended it didn’t happen at all. The fact that it was excessively weird only made the issue easier to avoid in his head.

Now, it was the time to face Sasuke. He had been the last hour saying to himself that he was ready for it, so when he saw the raven boy walking in silence down the corridor he stood up, his body tense as if he was about to fight him.

Sasuke looked at him with uninterested eyes, and smiled a little. “I see you’re not dead. What a pity.”

“You’re not helping me to not want to kick your ass.”

“Boys.” Sakura deadpanned, coming from behind Sasuke. “Please don’t make me want to throw myself out of the balcony so soon.”

Sasuke and Naruto took a seat in different couches, the crow guy with his eyes closed, Naruto throwing knives with his eyes at him. He didn’t know why he was so upset. Sure, he had the right to be, but it was like he couldn’t stand sharing his air with him. He was the center of all his problems at the moment, and every cell in Naruto’s body was screaming for him to stay as far as possible from him, as if distance would make everything work out. It was not a scream of fear or anything like that, but his muscles were tense, his eyes still fixated in him.

Sakura sighed next to him, as she contemplated the scenery between the two boys.

“Okay, I see a friendly interaction before going straight to the point isn’t your thing. Whatever” she said, her eyebrows arched, and not looking at either of them. “Naruto, yesterday, when Sasuke was with you at the Red Moon, did you feel anything weird?”

He tried to dilute his focus on Sasuke and looked at his friend as he crossed his arms, thinking. “I don’t think so. What did I miss?”

“Do you remember that time you saw a girl coming out of the bathroom a little disoriented?” she said, and Sasuke lifted his gaze. Maybe he didn’t know Naruto had seen that, he thought.

“Yeah, of course. Is this about that hypnosis thing?”

“Tsukuyomi” Sasuke said, bluntly.

“Uh?”

“Hypnosis sounds ridiculous. It’s called tsukuyomi”.

Naruto grunted. “Well, I don’t care. What about it, anyway?”

The pink haired girl moved in her seat and spoke. “You weren’t affected by it, right?”

“He wasn’t.”

“But why is this such a big deal? Maybe he didn’t do it right or something.”

Sasuke snorted and black eyes were directed at him. “No. It wasn’t me.”

“How can you be so sure? I did nothing to avoid anything because I didn’t know!” he complained, gazing at those black eyes again. The raven looked at him, disinterest gone, but eyes full with irritation and a wrinkled nose.

“Tsukuyomi is an ancient eye technique only some members of my family possess. I mastered it, and if it had failed, I’d know” he pronounced it with calmness, but his tongue almost spit venom at every word.

Naruto pressed his lips, annoyed. He obviously didn’t know anything about him or his family or his vampire powers, and everything he learnt made it worse.

“I didn’t feel anything, man. There’s nothing more to say about it” he crossed his arms behind his head, leaning his back on the couch.

“Naruto”, Sakura intervened, “that’s the point. It’s not normal that he couldn’t use it on you”.

“And…?”

“You could be in trouble”. She looked at him, worried. Silence settled between them for a second, Naruto processing, not only the words, but also the tone Sakura had used to pronounce them.

“Don’t fuck with me, what’s that supposed to mean?”

Sasuke moved and leaned his elbows on his knees. “It means you’re the only human being known to be immune to my family’s skill. And there’s plenty of people who want us down and for whom you’d be a useful weapon”.

He could almost feel his heart stop for a second, and instantly, Naruto’s energy was drained. What the heck? Was he really different than anyone else? Was he really that potentially valuable for others like Sasuke? His knee started bouncing in its seat, and nervousness flooded his nerves like boiling oil.

“Naruto,” he heard a feminine voice say beside him, and he escaped his daydream state, “right now you’re not in danger. We’ll make sure it stays that way”.

Naruto lifted his gaze, and scowled. “ _We_?”

She smiled, and stretched out her arm to pat his leg with affection. “Obviously. I appreciate your trust, but I don’t stand a chance against vampires on my own. Sasuke will help.” That last part sounded a bit like a threat, and Sasuke looked away at the mention of his name. Naruto’s eyes were as big as plates.

“Are you really gonna trust him? After he tried to _drink_ from me? Are you insane!” Naruto stood up, hands trembling, and turned around to face the other guy. “How do I know you aren’t going to try again, huh? How do I know you are not the one who’s gonna try to use me, if what you said is true to begin with?”, he said, now with renewed fury. His skull vibrated with an anticipated headache, thoughts blocked as if they weren’t able to flow. He didn’t care.

“Narut-!”

“Do you really think I’m okay with bearing with you? Having a five years old wandering around all day?” Sasuke said, still sitting in his place, his voice monotonous as always, but his eyes telling another thing. He looked daring.

Naruto got close to him until he was in front of him, still on his feet. “Well, maybe not if that five years old is your fucking _food_ ”.

“Guys! Cut it out, for fuck’s sake!” she stood up, anger in her eyes as well.

Thick silence filled the room, bit by bit, and Naruto could hear Sakura sighing low and slowly, as if the air was a scarce treasure. Then Sasuke stood up in front of him until he was looking at him from above (and fuck, he hadn’t thought their height difference could end being intimidating).

“If you want others to take you, it’s okay for me” Sasuke stated, with a rough, low voice. The atmosphere had totally changed to a colder one, the heat of Sakura’s house not being able to suppress it. It gave him goosebumps, and what would have been a response died in his throat. “But I assure you, depending on who ends up discovering you, most probably your experience with them won’t be as pleasant as with me.”

Naruto gave a step back without even considering it before, and his gaze reached the floor. He couldn't confront Sasuke's eyes for long in that state, and he felt absolutely helpless about it. They were dark pits which whispered the warning to swallow him whole if he was caught off guard.

He looked in front of him again, and forced himself to stare directly at Sasuke when he talked again, now with most of the former intensity lost. "Whatever. What can you do about it, anyway?"

"Well, we've already talked about it." Sakura said, bringing back a soft tone to the conversation. The atmosphere relaxed as he said those words, but not Naruto, who hadn’t released that much tension in his jaw. "He's gonna watch for you at night for a while when you're in public spaces. Just until we figure some things out."

Naruto blinked a few times, astonished. "Uh? Are you really trying to stick me with a vampire bodyguard? What the heck, Sakura!"

Sasuke shifted a little and crossed his arms, with a displeased grimace in his lips.

"Naruto, someone has to prevent other vampires from trying anything on you until we know why you weren't affected by Sasuke's tsukuyomi-!"

"Are you telling me you're okay with this?" he said, directed to Sasuke.

Sasuke looked back, uninterested. "Obviously not. But it’s the most reasonable choice."

"Naruto," Sakura warned, frowning, "I need you to trust Sasuke. You don't need to be fucking friends, just tolerate his presence until we're done with this!"

"Why are you talking like you've got this all figured out!" Naruto brought a hand to his hair and tugged it a little. "Fuck, how are you asking me to trust this moron after last night's show!"

He felt his head hot, and had to press his lips tight to avoid keep speaking. He was angry and confused, and had the urge to start running, or screaming, or doing both, but he knew that wouldn’t help. His friend was doing her best, but however, it was so hard. Hard features softened, and Sakura came closer to him.

"Don't trust him if you don't want to, but trust me. I trust him. Just give him a chance, and give _me_ a chance. We can't do this without someone who knows where we're entering."

Sasuke kept silent the entire exchange, and had sat again without Naruto noticing.

He took a few steps back and felt himself deflate on the couch. Everything about the situation felt like a trap, but not Sakura. He couldn’t just- not trust her. It was his best friend who they were talking about, his best friend who was willing to help even when he had got trouble in, literally, the fantasy (not fantasy anymore) creatures world. Naruto leaned his head on his hands and groaned.

“I hate this _so much,_ ” he whined. Then he formulated a question with a low, defeated voice. “What are you planning to do?”

“I have to talk to Tsunade about this. I’m sure she’ll help somehow… besides that, I don’t know. Sasuke?”

The raven boy lifted his gaze. "I should guard him. Also, I want to check if he's immune only to the tsukuyomi or if neither of my ocular techniques affect him".

Naruto tensed. The idea of becoming a lab rat wasn't appealing at all, even if it all made sense. Heck, that was the worst of it all: that everything was reasonable. Still, it didn't make it easier to admit out loud.

"Hell no. Nope nope nope. Not gonna happen."

"Naruto…"

"No."

"Naruto." Sasuke said, scowling, and he looked at him.

For an instant, his eyes looked just like they had looked the night before: there was something in them. He couldn't recognize what, but it wasn't like before. Still, it was only an instant.

“What?”

He smirked. “It wasn't that hard, wasn't it?”

Then he realised. "You fucking dumbshit-"

"You didn't feel anything. Don't be a crybaby."

"Well", he pressed his lips and frowned, "I-I don't know! You could have warned or something!"

Sakura looked at both of them like she was watching a tennis match, and then bursted into laughter. She doubled herself until she was facing the floor and tears were starting to form in her eyes.

Both boys shared the same look of astonishment and looked at the girl, then at each other.

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry! It's just-", she breathed hardly through a smile that covered her entire face, "It's just, it was exactly the same - oh my God -, it was _exactly_ the same as when a kid is getting vaccinated. And- and all of this- like, all of this nonsense and vampire thing!"

This time Naruto joined her laughter with a big smile and colored cheeks. Sasuke didn't make a sound, but he showed a lopsided smirk wider than usual.

"Sakura, stop scoffing at me! This is not funny!", he said, his smile wide. That only made her laugh louder.

Naruto reached for a blanket at the side of the couch and conveniently pushed the girl with his arm when he did, and they stayed like that until their laughter eventually came to an end. The other boy was silently listening to them, motionless again.

Sakura was the best at so many levels. She had involuntarily swept his stress of the moment away, and her laughter was so contagious he couldn’t stop himself from grinning. The air had stopped running cold around them, only to leave the warm atmosphere he was used to.

“Okay,” Naruto said, now with confidence. “Bring it on, pretty boy”.

“Hm?”

“Your vampire magic or whatever. Gimme everything you got. And Sakura, you watch out he doesn’t do anything weird.”

Sasuke frowned. "I'm not doing anything" he said, but didn't let that conversation keep going. "Look at me."

Naruto looked at Sakura, who moved in her seat and agreed with her head. Then he faced Sasuke again.

He could swear there was a red glint in his eyes the moment he looked at them. It only lasted a second, though, and then disappeared like it was never there to begin with. His eyes were dark, and no emotion came out from them. They didn't evoke any feeling in him, not fear, nor anger, but he couldn't make himself stop staring. Sakura's gaze lingered on him, he could feel it, but besides that, nothing. Just the smell of roses in the air and Sasuke’s black irises.

He twisted his mouth. Wasn't that a little bit uncomfortable? There was some kind of privacy going on between them that wasn't at all requested, and he wanted to look away, but also he didn't want to. He wasn’t sure he was able to.

Naruto didn't know if minutes had passed or just a few seconds until Sasuke turned his gaze away.

Then the raven boy shook his head. "Nothing."

Naruto woke up from his dream-like experience. "Uh?"

"Nothing worked."

"What?" Sakura's voice took the lead, shocked. "But it seemed- he looked so absorbed!"

"It wasn't me. He was just focused" Sasuke smirked in his direction with an accusing glint in his eyes, and Naruto couldn't avoid a slight blush to appear as he pressed his lips together.

Heck, he hadn't felt manipulated or anything, but his feeling of not being able to let go was surely there. It would be so ridiculous to admit that.

"Nah, I didn't feel anything special," he crossed his arms behind his head, and he laughed, feeling a little agitated. "I guess I'm your natural predator or something."

"You wish," Sakura said, smiling.

It hadn’t passed more than five seconds when Sasuke stood up unhurriedly. "I'll be going. Ask Tsunade, we'll be in touch."

"Wait!" Naruto said, standing up beside him. "What about the vampire bodyguard thing?"

Sasuke looked annoyed, as he settled a grimace in his face. He really didn't want to do that, huh? "I said we'll be in touch."

A quick farewell from Sakura and he was gone, shutting the door silently behind him. He stared at the door, and inevitably remembered when he saw him leave that night at the party at Kiba's. This time was under the stare of everyone in the living room, but either way felt the same. Things had changed considerably, though.

"Oh, _fuck_ " he heard Sakura mutter.

"What?"

"It's nine already."

The night was clear when Sasuke left Sakura’s home. A half-grinned moon greeted him as he started walking the way to his place at a slow pace. The moon appeared making fun of him.

He had been up for barely a few hours, but he felt so tired: he had run out of energy by the first word exchanged with Naruto. He wanted to perish so bad.

The encounter of the night before provoked a long forgotten emotion to appear inside him. He had felt, and still felt, embarrassed. It had been so embarrassing, all of it. He hadn’t only failed, but had failed so spectacularly.

It wouldn’t be important if just something would have happened that eluded him from nourishing that night, a regular thing. Maybe his target’s friends coming to take them, or them feeling extremely sick because of the drunkenness, something like that. But no. He had to find the one and only person known in more than a millennia of history of his clan that wasn’t threatened by his skills.

A groan escaped his throat, while walking through an empty alley. Luck had never been by his side, that was an almost proven fact, but this was ridiculous.

The soft clink of his keys in his pocket sounded as he took the elevator. He was going to sleep through all this mess and expect Sakura to inform him in the morning. The door opened, and he could see a mass of silver hair as he walked in front of the kitchen. The air was mixed with freshness from the open windows and curry from the pan the other man was in front of.

Suigetsu turned to see him leaning on the kitchen door frame, and gave him a puzzled look.

“Has a truck run over you? You look far shittier than usual.”

He closed his eyes for a second. “Almost.”

“Want some therapy curry with your man?” the man smiled and showed a row of shark-like teeth. “It hasn’t got zucchini this time. Come on.”

Sasuke sighed and took a plate from the shelf.

“As long as it doesn’t get me food poisoning.”

“Mean” he chuckled. “So, you gotta tell me what happened? I haven’t seen you in two nights.”

“Hm.”

“Wow, everything is clear now. Thank you so much for your eloquence” Suigetsu laughed, and filled both their plates with a mix of curry sauce, vegetables, meat and rice.

“Shut up.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sometimes you just gotta sleep with your best friend, eat pancakes for breakfast and watch high school musical together, or have a therapy curry with them...


	4. liquid smooth (mitski)

_I'm liquid smooth, come touch me, too  
And feel my skin is plump and full of life  
I'm in my prime  
I'm liquid smooth, come touch me, too  
I'm at my highest peak, I'm ripe  
About to fall  
_

It only took half an hour after waking up - until he dropped his cup full of milk over the floor, all over his slippers - to realise the day was going to be unbearable. He was feeling moody and tense, the most appropriate state to spend the whole day pouting over nothing. Because everything was _good_. Maybe he had lost the idea of normalcy for a while, but nothing bad was really on, he guessed? Everything was _fine_. Except he had just messed up his favourite breakfast cup and was more than ready to cry about it.

Maybe the texts Jiraiya sent him the night before hadn’t specially helped. Not that there was nothing special about them, they were just regular five in the morning drunk texts of him checking on Naruto, and he had read them in the morning like always. But they marked something he had known was coming: the start of lying to Jiraiya.

He really felt awful about it. He couldn’t recall a single time of lying to his grandpa for something more serious than a prank, and this vampire situation was serious enough to drive him crazy. And overall, his favourite frog-themed cup was dead.

He grunted loudly.

Fortunately, Jiraiya wouldn’t come home for a solid month, or maybe even more. His writing stuff had him travelling across Europe, and he was surely having fun, so yeah, he had some time to figure all the trouble out.

He was mopping the kitchen floor while singing to Taylor Swift (more like getting his whiny mood reinforced by her saving-pop-music-while-crying-over-her-exs powers) when he received a call from Sakura.

“Hey, Naruto! Could you pass by the hospital by twelve or so?” her voice was accompanied by the soft sound of steps, and he had no trouble imagining her wandering around the long, spotless hospital corridors.

“Yeah, of course” he sighed, and pressed his lips in a thin line. That was fast for a busy ol’ hag like Tsunade. But well, the topic was kind of urgent, he guessed, so let’s get over with it. “Do I wait at the door or…?”

“Yes, wait at the back door and I’ll pick you up”, her voice stopped (not the steps, though), but only a second. “Naruto, you all right? I can see your miserable face from here.”

Naruto undid the grimace he was holding involuntarily and grunted. Sakura had never had trouble reading through him. “Having a bad day.”

“It’s only ten in the morn-”

“Enough for it to be bad!” he exclaimed. He left the mop leaning against the closest wall, and directed his eyes over the wet sections of the floor tiles. “My frog cup fell.”

“Oh _fuck_ ” her voice muffled over the phone, as if she suddenly held it closer. “Which one?”

Naruto felt a lump in his throat. He couldn’t believe he was getting that sentimental over a fucking _mug_. “The one with tiny frog legs attached, with the big, cool, orange eyes.”

“Oh no….” she sounded truly affected, which could have been hilarious if only there was another person to listen to it who wasn’t emotionally involved in the tragedy concerning them.

“ _I know right._ But don’t worry, I’ll look for another one or something.”

“Well, but it deserves a nice funeral. Wanna grab some take-out tonight? I finish my shift early.”

Naruto smiled with fondness. “Nah, gotta work. But I appreciate your condolences.”

Then, a silence. He was about to ask Sakura if she was still there when she spoke again. “Are you really going to work tonight?” If he closed his eyes, he could imagine her half disappointed, half worried face perfectly.

“C’mon, Sakura. Just because Sasuke discovered this doesn’t mean every vamp in the whole city is going after me right away! I can’t just stop going to work like that. I’ve already been a couple of days in my house and _I’m hitting the roof_.”

“But-”

“Sakura. The walls are shrinking. And I’m going up them. I’m hitting the roof. With my head. Repeatedly.”

“Okay, geez. Just wait to know what Tsunade thinks about it, okay?”

“Of course” he promised, lowering his tone to a more serious one so Sakura would be convinced.

“Alright. See you later, dum-dum. At twelve!”

And then she was gone. Naruto checked his phone as the call ended and Taylor Swift started playing again. He had over an hour to clean the mess in his kitchen, prepare himself a proper breakfast, cry a little over his lost mug and get ready to go. He put the toaster to work and started to gather up the dismembered body of his froggy cup to give him a formal burial.

He spent fifteen minutes in front of the back door of the hospital, wandering around as if his legs had an unlimited energy supply, which they sort of usually had. He had arrived early, nerves prickly in the upper layer of his skin.

It wasn't rare for him to see Tsunade: she was almost his… aunt? grandma? graunt? Aunt, most likely, since she had aged well (almost magically well). But it felt different this time. Naruto had already shared a conversation about vampires with Sakura and Sasuke: Sakura, his best friend, mentally connected to him at this point, and Sasuke, who felt more like a main character in a Netflix series than a real presence, and was like a product of the circumstances in Naruto's mind.

He tapped his jeans again and again, as he kept wandering around. The thing was, this would be the first time to talk it out with someone out of the small circle of people who already knew about it.

A voice rang over his thoughts, and the door opened behind him, bringing a white coated Sakura behind it.

She smiled at him and Naruto followed through the corridors, which smelled like disinfectant and old ladies. Nevertheless, it was full of people rushing up and down stairs, the sound of trolleys getting pushed through the plain floor and agitated conversations.

Sakura talked to him about a patient she'd seen that morning, who had a nasty scar from a motorcycle accident. Luckily, that was all the damage the girl had gotten, but Sakura spent a solid five minutes describing how gross the scar was going to be. Naruto laughed, put disgusted faces and pushed Sakura's arm when the description was far too detailed.

When they arrived at the place, with a door with a golden nameplate on it, Tsunade was already waiting for them.

Naruto smiled brightly at the sight of Tsunade, who had her hair tied up in a ponytail and small glasses on the bridge of her nose, and shot a smirk at him. "What's up, ol' lady?"

"Sakura, bring this child to that pediatrician on the second floor. He might have gotten lost" she said, with her smile still hanging and her perfect red nails pointing the closest stairs.

He roared in laughter and brought her close for a quick hug. Sakura smiled politely at their side, eyes warm and affectionate. Sometimes he forgot that, for her, Tsunade was an authority, not just the weird, medic aunt of her best friend.

Tsunade moved away from the hug and hit Naruto's back a few times with an open palm and excessive force. “Enough, you dimwit. Come on in before I change my mind.”

One could think the office of the most recognized doctor of the city would be spotless, but nothing further from reality. There was a small door inside the room which led to the examination room, that obviously fulfilled all the medic protocols of neatness, but in front of them lied Tsunade's _office_.

Piles of forms and case studies filled the space over and behind an enormous desk, completing a view of white papers sometimes cheered up by bright colored file folders. A green pencil case showed up diverse pens of different colours and brands, mostly publicity pens from the hospital. A huge window was almost closed behind the desk, and it left a soft current of fresh air to fill the ambience. Naruto breathed in slowly, being grateful about the air smelling a little less like hospital and a bit more like winter during a sunny day and women perfume.

Tsunade moved the chair behind the desk and they both took a seat in front of it, as if they were in an ordinary consultation and not to discuss how vampires may affect his life from now on. It was almost funny.

"Alright, kiddo. Let's catch up, I don't know any details yet".

And just like that, Naruto proceeded to tell her everything. How Sasuke had come to him in the Red Moon, how he had sunk his teeth a little and then they both had started panicking. How they'd talked the other day. Sakura intervened a few times to put some details into context, and Tsunade hummed silently. None of them seemed to care about Naruto's quick pace when talking.

He appreciated Sakura's presence _so much_ in that moment. Even if he trusted Tsunade, talking about this stuff really got on his nerves. His fingers twiddled under the desk, and his feet bounced a little during the whole conversation.

Tsunade and Sakura looked oddly used to the topic. He couldn't find any trace of surprise in Tsunade's face, and Sakura's eyes only exuded determination and professionalism. But now that he thought of it, she told him this whole vampire issue was a secret between them, since she helped with blood reserves and stuff.

It kind of made sense, to see them both talking like _that_ was normal.

When everything that happened was exposed, Tsunade lifted her voice for the first time.

"This isn't normal".

" _Sweet_ " Naruto barked, his body falling flat against the back of his chair. Sakura murmured a disgusted "Naruto" at his side, but he didn't look her way.

"Let me explain myself before you start panicking, dimwit" she said, eyes daring. He sat a little more nicely in his seat. "I've never seen anyone like you, not being affected by their abilities. Which is not rare, because there's not much information about them or about people who knew of their existence, and the information which exists is just so fucking _hard_ to put a finger on".

He talked not even a second after Tsunade, words fast in his mouth. "Makes sense. So what do we do?"

" _Calm_ and listen to me, god dammit" she said, exasperated. She took her small, rectangular glasses from her face and put them down on the desk, with a scowl in her face. "I'm going to run a few tests with a blood sample of yours, to begin with."

He opened his eyes like plates. "Oh my god" he turned to Sakura, and opened his mouth without having given the time to his brain to think anything slightly rational. "You didn't tell me she was going to take my blood!"

Sakura looked at him, ready to fight. "Naruto, you can't be reproaching me this, right now". It sounded like a warning.

He didn't care.

"Like I'm gonna let her draw my blood! That's disgusting!"

"Are you fucking telling me that you prefer to let alone the possibility of real _vampires_ hunting _you_ down rather than letting Tsunade, the closest person to being able to help you, study your blood?"

" _Yes_ ".

"Child, you're too grown up for this" Tsunade massaged the bridge of her nose with closed, tired eyes.

"Needles don't stop being terrifying with _age_. That wouldn't make any sense!"

Sakura groaned out loud. "Naruto, I swear to god. If I have to knock you out, I _will_ ".

She looked him in the eyes with a menacing gaze. Naruto could almost _feel_ Sakura's eyes in the back of his skull, piercing his whole head to get there.

Maybe a needle was just slightly better than Sakura beating him down to death in a hospital. He didn't want to die that soon.

He breathed deeply. " _Alright_. But I will hate every second of it" he looked at Tsunade, frowning deeply. "And I'm trusting you to hit the right vein at the first try and make the most of _every. Single. Drop_ ".

Tsunade chuckled, looking down at him with teasing eyes. “And what if I don’t?”

Naruto snorted, smiling. “I would say that you’d be dead, but I’d probably just cry a bit”.

The woman blurted out a long laugh and doubled over herself a little, and Naruto couldn’t help but accompany her in the motion. Sakura closed her eyes in silence, but her shoulders shuddered as she held back a guffaw.

Tsunade hit the desk with an open palm and full force, using the inertia to stand up. “Alright, kid. Let’s go to the other room”.

They stood up behind her and followed her through the door that connected to the examination room. There was a stretcher close to one of the walls, in which there were some posters hung up. Normally they’d be divulgational stuff, but in this case they looked more like full publications, with weird, complicated graphs. On the opposite wall, a small window was slightly open. There were some shelves with big, white drawers. Tsunade took some plastic gloves and put them on.

“Sit in the stretcher, please” she said, her gaze lost in a drawer, where she took some crystal transparent test tubes. She took exactly _three of them_. “Sakura, would you mind putting the blood pressure monitor?” she offered it to her, with one hand.

“Are you gonna fill _all_ of those?” Naruto said, his voice coming out a little panicked. “What the _fuck_ are you planning to do with my blood?”

“This is just to measure blood pressure. Spread out your arm”, Sakura mumbled at his side, ignoring willingly Naruto’s whine. He did as told, and she put a black fabric bracelet around Naruto’s arm, and checked the numbers appearing on the monitor. “Everything alright”.

Tsunade nodded. “It’s just in case. I may not need all of these, but who knows. Elastic band”.

Sakura took the elastic band the woman offered her, and ripped off the bracelet of Naruto’s arm. She put the elastic band in his forearm without hesitation. Naruto felt the pressure of it, and could feel the nervousness in his gut. “But seriously, what are you doing with it?” Tsunade turned to him, needle in hand. Sakura took a seat next to him on the stretcher. His skin now prickled with anticipation.

Tsunade paused for a second, as if she had to actually think about it. Then she lifted her gaze to him. “Years ago, I was friends with a vampire. Jiraiya and I were, actually”.

She paused again, like she had finished talking, and kept doing things. Naruto blinked twice, her mouth parted. “Jiraiya?!” he blurted, louder than he expected.

Jiraiya knew about everything.

He felt confusion, but mainly, _relief_. He wouldn’t need to hide anything from him anymore, if things went right, and that was _awesome_. Tsunade kept talking, this time without looking at him in the eye. “Yeah, Jiraiya”. A tiny smile appeared on her lips, but she looked so tired. What had happened?

“Our friend. He was, he _is_ , kind of a science freak. And I kind of was, too. So we ran a few tests, collected some data”. The needle was shiny in her hands. “We didn’t discover much, because we parted ways in the end. But, well. I have some intuition about where to look. Just let me handle it”.

He felt an acute prick in his arm, and jumped a little. “Ouch! You could have warned, what the fuck!”

Tsunade grinned. “Stop complaining, child. Just pump your fist a few times and relax”.

Naruto insulted a few times under his breath (gaining a smack on the back of the neck coming from Sakura), but did as told.

The transparent tube connecting the needle started turning crimson, unhurried. As the color made progress through it, he felt the slow flowing of the blood inside his skin. He was surprised as he was able to admit that it was not an absolutely unpleasant feeling. It could be described like a slight stinging in a place you couldn’t scratch. His arm felt numb and heated, and his heart was beating fast at the foreign sensation, following the rhythm of his own nervousness, prickly in his head.

He found himself wondering if this would be what he would have felt if Sasuke had sunk his fangs some centimeters deeper the other night.

“You alright, Naruto?” Sakura asked, her hand becoming a steady and gentle pressure against his shoulder.

Naruto lifted his gaze to green, worried eyes. “Yeah, just zoning out” he grinned without effort, and Sakura relaxed visibly. “So grandma, what happened?”

“Hm?” said Tsunade, who was sitting now in a chair in front of them.

“Why did you stop working on this cool stuff?” Because yeah, it might me hella scary, but it was so _cool_. Tsunade had just revealed that she was a doctor who did clandestine work to investigate the science behind _vampires_ like it was nothing. And also, that Jiraiya knew about it and was friends with one, but he’s trying not to think about it at the moment.

“Our friend wanted to cross barriers that Jiraiya and myself considered unacceptable. So we stopped working together” she left her weight fall into his knees, leaning on her elbows. She suddenly looked so old, her tired eyes morphing her entire face. Naruto regretted for a moment having asked her that. “I’ve been looking over my notes and studying some things, but without one of them helping, it’s pretty hard, even for me” she added, with a sour laugh.

“Don’t worry, ma’am. This amazing body is gonna bring you some fresh info” Naruto bursted out, pointing at himself. Sakura looked on the verge of passing out when he moved so fast, the catheter still connected to his arm.

“Oh my god, Naruto, stop”. Sakura said, keeping him in place. Naruto couldn’t do anything more than laugh loudly.

Tsunade huffed, hiding a smirk. “We’ll see, kiddo”.

“Oh, ma’am,” Sakura said, lifting her gaze, with her hands still on Naruto’s arm. He couldn’t avoid thinking that it was a protective and cute gesture “what do you think he should do? Do you think it’s safe for him to keep his normal routine?”

Oh boy, there we went. Naruto had forgotten about how neurotic Sakura was about the whole situation. And he would admit, she _had the right to_. But if she thought he was going to just sit at home and wait for something to happen? Uh-huh.

“Sasuke hasn’t refused to help, right?” Tsunade asked, careful with her words. Maybe she didn’t get along with Sasuke either?

“Do I _really_ need to stick with that moron?”

“Yes, he has agreed to it. I mean, he’s not thrilled either, but I think that’s as much as we can get” Sakura shrugged, ignoring Naruto's complaint.

Tsunade giggled. “If the boy has agreed to it, just do as he says”.

“But he’s a moron!” Naruto grunted, loudly. He moved his head fast with the energy his complaint needed, and suddenly felt dizzy. “Uh”.

“Naruto could you please _don’t_?”.

“Oh, he is,” Tsunade assured, arms crossed on her chest “but he knows better about his kind. There’s not a lot of them, as far as I’m aware, so it’s easy for them to keep an eye on each other.”

“But which is the risk? I’m not gonna wear a fucking sign for them to notice me or something.”

“I don’t really know the risk, kid. I’m helping you with what I can reach, which is the little I know about them, speaking in medical terms”. He felt a little weakened at that comment. Deep in his gut, he was expecting Tsunade to be a know-it-all and have the answers to everything he needed. He knew she was doing everything in her hand, but now he felt more like a lab rat than anything else. “Let’s take the catheter out, we have more than enough blood already. Stay still”.

While Sakura was taking it out and applying a ball of cotton on the wound, he directed his gaze to the crimson tubes Tsunade was labelling and taking apart. The liquid was so thick, so viscous and static, it was hard to believe some minutes sooner it was flowing inside his body, propelled by a constant _thump thump_. The color was so remarkable, he had the feeling that, if it was kept unmoving like that, it might become solid, like a lipstick, or something like that. Sakura had one of that color, he believed. Cool.

“Well, as long as I can keep going to work, I guess I’ll deal with him well enough!” he smiled, content. He wasn’t excited about it, but at least he didn’t need to stay at home. Those were definitely good news. “Also, I should be extra careful only at night, right? Easy-peasy”.

“Don’t declare victory yet, kid” Tsunade said, yet with a less serious voice. “I know it’ll be hard, but try not to be a dumbass. Especially if you confront one of them, which I hope won’t happen”.

“Obviously, ol’ hag. What do you take me for?”

“A five years old” Sakura dropped, as if it was the most obvious answer in the whole world.

“Exactly”.

At this insulting exchange, Naruto could do anything more than offer a smirk and raise his brows. “Oh, yeah? Would a five years old have hooked up with a vampire?”

“Naruto!” Sakura exclaimed, now flushed. Naruto was well aware something like that couldn’t have scared her off, but maybe something like that in front of her superior _could_. Even though Tsunade was laughing loudly at the moment.

She brushed a finger over her eyelashes, taking off a couple of tears from them. “Well, _actually_ , maybe you were like a five years old for him”.

Naruto, who was accompanying Tsunade in her laughing until just one second ago, felt his smile drop. It dropped to the ground, probably pierced through the five consecutive floors and reached the dirt and then _drowned_ in it. “Wait, what?” He… he really hadn’t thought about it. Wasn’t it hot in there?

“Just” Tsunade said, a teasing smile still in her face “don’t think about it”.

Sakura sounded compassionate when he spoke. “Naruto… but did you really not think about it?”

“No, no I didn’t??? I was- I was too focused on the blood sucking part? I don’t know!” Had he felt horny for a thousand years old boy? Old man? What if Sasuke had grandchildren? Oh my god.

“It’s not important, kid. It’s not like it’s against any law, since his passport probably says he’s your age". Tsunade giggled, as if she found Naruto's reaction the most funny and trivial thing in the world. "And even if it was, how do you youngsters say it? Be gay, do crimes?”

Naruto grunted loudly, mumbling a "this is not funny" under his breath.

Tsunade looked down at him with entertained eyes. She looked old, at these times. Her eyes told that she was observing things as if it reminded her of old memories, as if she was old enough to not live them but just remember them. “C’mere and stop complaining. I have something for you”. She brought her hands to her neck, taking off a middle sized pendant. “This necklace is made out of opal. Just a cool stone on the outside, but vampires are weak to it". Naruto reached it with careful hands.

The stone looked _so_ cool. It didn't weigh a lot in his hands, and was oval shaped. It looked white at first sight, but nothing further than the truth. It emitted all the rainbow palette, and as he moved it in his hand, the colors changed their place and size. Every movement changed them and every change of point of view changed them, even if the rock was immobile. Not the whole surface of the rock was shining, but Naruto felt like he was holding magic in his hands either way.

What the heck. Was that stone natural? Just like that, nature goes "let's go keeping a rainbow in a _rock_ "? Or was it manufactured by other supernatural beings, maybe? It had to be leprechauns, if they existed. Naruto wished they didn't.

The woman kept talking while Naruto examined the necklace. "It doesn’t kill them, or burn their skin, it just weakens their powers if you keep it close to them. It was my grandpa's, so be careful with it”.

Naruto smiled and put the necklace around his neck. He had only had the occasion to hear Tsunade refer to his grandpa a handful of times, but he _knew_ she really loved him. To think she was trusting him with one of his possessions gave him goosebumps. “But their powers don’t cause any effect on me anyway, right? So what's this for?”

Tsunade hummed. “As long as we know, you can avoid any skill that affects your cognitive abilities, but I don’t think you can do anything to their speed or strength” she crossed her arms. “Except for working out, if you want to see it that way" a laugh bursted out of her throat, explosive.

“Alright, makes sense" he shrugged.

"And how come that a rock is more powerful than a supernatural human kind? Isn’t that kind of... ridiculous?” Sakura asked, frowning. "I mean. It sounds like kryptonite".

“Yes, it is, but what can I say. These are weird times” she smiled, entertained, and leaned more comfortably against the rest of her seat. “I think it’s related to their physical properties. Opals are iridescent, that’s why they have all those fancy colors. It modifies light somehow. But don’t ask me anymore about it, because I don’t know how it works”.

Naruto agreed, not understanding a thing. “Vampires are real bitches about light related things, uh? Okay, got it. I’ll treat your necklace well, don’t worry about it!” he offered a wide grin and a thumbs up. How bad could things get if he had natural anti-vampire talent and the closest thing to a protective talisman?

“Alright, kiddo. Now, get out of here. I have work to do, and something tells me Sakura does too” Sakura's eyes got darker. It was unavoidable, anytime anyone reminded her of the work she had left, her face fell into despair. He chuckled a little.

“I’ll accompany him to the entrance. See you later, ma’am” she said, tugging Naruto's sleeve and standing up.

“One last thing. Uh” he said, already in front of the door “does Jiraiya know about this? I wasn’t sure if I could talk about it with him, but…” with the news of his grandpa knowing about vampires for years, things were different. He didn't think he had assimilated it yet.

Tsunade looked at him with compassionate eyes. "He doesn't know. I preferred to leave that choice to you" she stood up, slowly. "I warn you, though. If you decide not to tell him yet but the risk becomes too high, he'll be the first to know. I won't be the one hearing his complaints if something happens to you".

Naruto agreed, hesitant, and left with Sakura by his side. He didn't know what to do about Jiraiya. It would be easy enough to keep him updated, but he really didn't want to interfere in his tour and worry him sick.

He would wait. He'd wait and see if a red flag appeared to sign that he was in danger. In that case, he'd let him know.

It wasn’t until a few days later that he saw Sasuke again. Naruto was behind the counter of the Red Moon, on the watch for new clients, when Sasuke entered the local. He was wearing gray (or at least he thought they were gray, the red lights messed his color perception up) jeans and a loose black shirt. His bangs fell irregularly on his shoulders, while the rest of his hair was tied in a tiny, low ponytail.

He felt himself blush a little and looked the other way, ignoring his presence just for a minute. Seeing him at Sakura’s had been relatively normal, since the context was different. But the last time he had seen him in the bar, under red lights and on the other side of the counter, had been… well. A whole different situation. You know, this would have been extremely easy if only he hadn’t been flirting with him in exactly the same spot they were at the moment.

Not that he was going to let him know about this awkwardness, of course. This wasn’t awkward. _It wasn’t_.

It was ridiculous to try to ignore him more than a minute, though. It was early in the night and the place wasn’t full in any way possible. As Sasuke approached the counter, he slided to his direction and smiled brightly. Fake it until you make it, they say. “Took you long enough!”

And it was true. He didn’t like the idea of having him as a vampire bodyguard (even if the concept sounded _amazing_ ), but he had been going to work for about a week without Sasuke appearing.

“I was busy”. Black, apathetic eyes.

And oh, he had forgotten that for a minute. Every possible previous nervousness fell to his feet like a stone, and he wrinkled his nose a little. He had been focusing too much in the “I hooked up with him and he’s a _vampire_ ” thing and too less in the “he’s a fucking _dick_ when he’s not flirting”.

“Uh, not that I care. But I prefer not to worry Sakura, you asshole” he spurted, and contained the momentary need of sticking his tongue out. Like a child. He didn’t care, he probably was a child to him anyway… uh. “Want something to drink?”

Sasuke directed his gaze somewhere else. “A beer, please”.

“Shouldn’t you be drinking red wine or something like that?” That phrase had not passed any filter before being said. Obviously.

The raven boy looked at him again, brows frowned. “Do you really believe everything you see on the television?”

Naruto blurted a laugh. “ _No_. But since you do have all the vibes, it’s weird. You’re just ruining it”. Sasuke didn’t say a thing. He just- looked at him.

He spoke again, with an urge to fill the silence that had built between them. Even if it had lasted no more than a second. “Y’know. Dark clothes, dark hair. White skin. Those mystery man vibes” he moved his hands, and leaned a little on the counter. “I mean, just tell me you play that kind of fancy piano in a huge mansion at the end of the town and I’ll believe it”.

Sasuke’s frown hadn’t dissolved yet. “I do not own a mansion” he answered, with a disgusted tone. Naruto thought that was going to be the end of the conversation, and hurried to fill a jar of beer and put it in front of him. Surprisingly, Sasuke spoke again. “Fancy piano?”

He blinked a few times, caught off guard. “Yeah, uh. That kind of super fancy piano that always appears in abandoned, spooky mansions in the movies” he brought the nail of his thumb finger to his mouth in a thoughtful posture. “I think they are sometimes played in church?”

“You mean… an organ.”

He blurted a laugh. What was this guy even saying? “No, _duh_. Unless that you’re referring to when you play something _from the_ _heart._ How are you gonna play music with an organ?”

Sasuke’s frown melted to a… surprised grimace? Kind of. It looked like he was worried? But also like he was watching something disgusting? He truly couldn’t decipher his face. He emitted suffocated “oh my god” in what was almost a whisper.

“What?” Naruto scowled, a little worried. He didn’t understand what had just happened.

Sasuke suddenly put a bill on the counter and stood up. Naruto called out for him, but he just turned around and left to sit at a table, at one corner of the local, out of his reach. He had looked troubled, but what had he said to make him react that way? He was pretty sure he didn’t say anything. What a jerk.

They didn’t make contact again until the end of the night. Sasuke had just sat there, in his corner, and drank a couple jars of beer slowly. Was it how it was going to be from now on? He, spending the whole night alone, just watching the people who entered the pub?

Naruto started to clean the now empty tables and approached him, with a tray full of empty beer bottles on one hand. “Are you going to spend full nights here _completely alone_ everyday just like this?”

The raven looked up to him. “Just until I check something”.

“And what is that you’re checking?”

No answer. Oh my god. He was not ready to deal with his shit. “Alright, fucking moron. You can leave now anyway, I’m done for the night”. It was one in the morning already. Just some preparations and he’d be sleeping like a baby in no time.

Sasuke sighed, tired eyes. Could vampires be physically tired? “I’m leaving with you. Just hurry up, moron”.

“You don’t have to if it will be such a pain in the ass for you, y’know?”

“If you don’t want it to be, _hurry up_ ”.

Naruto clenched his jaw hard, looking at him with angry eyes. “Does anyone pay you to be a dick in public?” He took the jar in front of him and put it in the tray, even if it wasn’t empty yet, and then left to continue his chores.

He couldn’t stand when he did that. He was acting like he was saving his life just by _standing there_. As if Naruto couldn’t save himself with his weird superpower and the opal around his neck, what the heck! He got it, Sasuke was a vampire. That was cool, he guessed? But not a reason to be treating people with superiority, like he had to be thanked just for _existing_.

He cleaned the tables and the counter with renewed energy. If he was tired and aching for a bed five minutes earlier, it couldn’t be told.

When he arrived at the entrance, Sasuke was waiting for him there, now with a long, black coat around his shoulders. Naruto didn’t stop walking, not acknowledging his presence. Not that the raven needed it, though, ‘cause he started walking behind him unhurriedly anyway.

Naruto walked at a normal pace, content feeling the cold on his cheeks. He was more of a summer person, but after a whole night working in a hole, some fresh air was always comforting. Also, the city was quiet at night, and the city lights reflected on the floor he was stepping on. He still desired _so much_ to get under his bed sheets, but it had its charm either way.

Sasuke’s presence startled him more than it should, though, making him want to walk faster to stop having a shadow. The fact that he couldn’t hear his steps behind him made him more uncomfortable if it was even possible. He even turned around a few times to check if he was there or had just left.

A voice broke the silence when they were just three minutes from home. “Naruto.”

He turned around, and saw Sasuke holding a small paper. “What do you want?” he replied, bitterly.

He took the paper. A string of numbers were written in bold, beautiful calligraphy. It was his fucking _phone number_. Naruto contained his urge to start laughing. “What, do you miss me already or what?”

Sasuke rolled his eyes. “Text me your schedule in the Red Moon. I’m no psychic and I’m not going to wait for you every night even when you don’t work, imbecile.”

Naruto opened his mouth to say something, but blanked out. I mean, that actually made sense. It just- he had given for granted that he’d be anywhere he’d be. “Don’t your vampire powers make it easier to find me or something?”

Then Sasuke smirked, when he was about to turn around and leave. “Edward was a stalker, Naruto. Good night.”

He fell asleep feeling like an idiot.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> uni is giving me no time to breath lately, so maybe it'll take me three weeks instead of two to update every time :( i'll try not to, though! let's see how this goes
> 
> comments are appreciated !! i feel like a teacher talking to nothingness in zoom sessions. anyway, i hope you're enjoying this!


	5. they are night zombies!! they are neighbors!! they have come back from the dead!! ahhhh! (sufjan stevens)

_Speaking their names, they shake the flag  
Waking the earth, it lifts and lags  
We see a thousand rooms to rest  
Helping us taste the bite of death  
_

“You know, I am not used to you being so active” Suigetsu was sitting on the couch with his legs crossed under him, and looked at him while stirring the drink in his hands. He was wearing his usual, just a tie dye sweatshirt and some blue short pants. His silver hair was tied up in a small ponytail at the top of his head. It looked ridiculous.

“By active, you mean out of bed”. Sasuke leaned on the door frame, and arranged his bangs passing his fingers through them as good as he could. He didn’t want to know how bad his bed head was.

“Out of bed _before midnight_ ” he emphasized. “Like, shit, it’s sunset right now. You’re awake at sunset. That’s so fucking early!”

“So what?”

“Nothing. I just wanted to let you know that I’m so fucking astonished. And to ask if you’re feeling like a new man, etcetera” the man chuckled a little, and Sasuke sighed. He couldn’t decide if Suigetsu was acting like his mother or like a kid. Probably both. “Want some milk tea?”

He hummed under his breath. “What tea is it?”

“Vanilla black tea”.

“Did you put sugar in it?”

“No, you fucking _sourpuss_. And I did it for _you_ ” Suigetsu pointed at him with his free hand, repeatedly. “I don’t know why you have to ruin everything nice, why are you like this?”

He gave his back to his flatmate and entered the kitchen, to see a steaming pot on the stove. The stove was turned off, but the heat persisted. Sasuke reached the cabinet and held a plain black mug in his hand. “The thing that should be worrying you is why haven’t your fangs fallen already, you fucking dickhead. You eat too much sweet” he said, not caring about raising the volume to let himself be heard from the living room.

A shout responded quickly. “It’s called _hygiene_ , Uchiha! I brush my teeth! Thoroughly! Try it sometime!”

He smirked in silence and served the drink patiently. It had been like this for years. Suigetsu and him could not have interacted in thirty years while living in the same house, but then when they did, they hated each other. Only, they didn’t really hate each other.

Sasuke appeared in the living room and sat on a chair in the dinner table “I brush my teeth.”

Suigetsu spurted a choked laugh, not directing his gaze to him. “Yeah, says the one who skipped over twenty years sleeping. I didn’t see you brush your teeth back then.” He was watching the now switched on television. A show for kids was playing, but he didn’t recognise it. He’d gotten really bad at recognising famous things as the years passed. 

He rolled his eyes, still stuck to the tv. “I’m gonna murder you”, he said. But it came out so emotionless, the intent was lost in the air as the words were being pronounced.

“I’d love to see you try” the answer came in the same way. None of them moved an inch from their seats.

They stayed like that for a while, in relative silence only interrupted by the occasional giggles of his flatmate, who loved animation shows for kids and laughed to every triviality. Sasuke took sips of his tea slowly. It was only when the show came to an end and advertisements started playing that Suigetsu turned to him and spoke again, his cheerful attitude quickly lost.

“I have news.”

He sighed. Suigetsu had talked seriously enough not to be joking, so he guessed what was coming was not funny. “Spit it out.”

“They aren’t bad news. They are _lukewarm_ news” the man said, insecure voice out. He seemed to know he wasn’t gonna like whatever he wanted to say.

“Suigetsu.”

“So,” the silver haired guy shifted on the couch, turning his whole body in his direction “I hung out with Kisame yesterday.”

“You hung out with an Akatsuki member”. If glances could kill, Suigetsu would lay dead. And at that moment, Sasuke wouldn’t have minded.

“Sasuke, _he’s cool_. May I remind you that Akatsuki is no more than a friend group?”

“ _Orochimaru_ is in there” _Itachi is in there._

Suigetsu lifted his hands to the air. “And no one knows why! He’s friends with nobody in particular, he’ll just disappear someday. Could you please stop being a _pussy._ ”

He wrinkled his nose, feeling how heat crept out through his throat. He put himself on his feet and started walking to his room. He really was not in the mood for a fight with Suigetsu just because his two brain cells had malfunctioned and punched each other to lead him to hang out with an Akatsuki member. 

“Sasuke! Jesus Christ” he heard the other man get up from the couch as he was opening the door. “I’m gonna fucking kill you one day of these, I swear. Could you listen to me? _Please_?”

Sasuke stared at him with clenched teeth, and contained the urge to reply something childish. He stood still in front of his door, though. Suigetsu understood his posture, and sighed, his fingers lost nervously in some locks that had escaped the hair tie.

“He told me they are in town. They’re sticking to their plan of shifting their residence every fifteen years.” Carefully, Suigetsu started explaining to him the districts they were in and how they were distributed.They usually splitted in groups of two, so their dynamics weren’t too noticeable by the people who lived around. It seemed the Red Moon was just about three blocks away from Deidara and Sasori’s current neighbourhood. That would explain the crash he had with Deidara some weeks ago. 

He contained his breath. It had been a stroke of bad luck that they had ended up coming to the exact city they were in, but again, he knew it was part of their changing residence plans. Hopefully, they’d leave in a few years. But, _fuck_. Naruto. Naruto’s bare existence was so fucking _problematic_.

“So, Orochimaru is the only one who’s living on his own. He has a mansion at the end of town, so he’s staying-”

Sasuke cut out whatever he was saying. “Did you tell him about Naruto?”

Suigetsu reacted a second late, still shocked by the interruption, but showed his best offended face and his pointy teeth in an open mouth grimace. “Dude, do you really think I’d do that? _What the fuck!_ ”

He shrugged. “You keep surprising me by being dumb,” he said, quite rude. Suigetsu started whining about their friendship and his trust in him, and Sasuke just closed the door of his room to his face and left him there.

An exasperated noise could be heard from the other side of the door when he let his back hit the bed. He had thought about asking why the fuck had Kisame given all that information, but the worst thing was that he already knew. It obviously was all Itachi’s doing. 

Itachi wanted him to know.

A frown settled hard between his brows. Everything was so terribly and unnecessarily complicated. He felt the emergence of anger coming up his throat, burning behind his tongue, finding a home in the back of his head.

Peace hung like a thin thread for his kind. He knew. The main reason why anyone had claimed a place of dominance over the rest of them was that they couldn’t, and the Uchiha massacre had been the proof of that. The blood of his family was still fresh on the floors of the unliving. At the moment, every vampire knew none of them held the ability to submit the rest, not least the living. 

Sasuke didn’t especially care about the well being of the living, and he cared less if possible about the unliving. But he was aware that a vampire who became able to incapacitate every vampire’s skill would break the existing delicate equilibrium. They’d been lucky that the person who had appeared with that ability was a human.

Every vampire was human once. That made them, at least, respectful with the living. Even if someone who was eager with power appeared every now and then, they still had some (questionable) _morals_. However, if someone did not, it was Orochimaru. He didn’t care about messing with the living, nor the unliving, as long as necessary to fill his resources, and this turned him in a silent kind of menace. All his movements were precise and exact, gathering power little by little, being this power no more than real understanding about their kind.

And maybe Sasuke didn’t care about the future of any of the Earth inhabitants, but oh, did he care about Orochimaru. He surely cared enough to not let him put a finger in a nourishing prey like Naruto.

Orochimaru wouldn’t be the one to stand over the rest of them, as long as he was alive. And unfortunately, he’d probably be alive for a while.

He turned his body to the right, and faced the wall beyond the bed. He had woken up just an hour ago and already felt like sleeping fifty years.

He took his phone from the nightstand and watched lazily how it turned on. Suigetsu loved those little devices and spent the whole day rambling about them and some new platform that had been launched, but Sasuke barely touched it. He used the most necessary apps, and that was all.

He opened the text message app only to see a new message from an unknown number. An unknown number who was obviously Naruto, since the message contained a string of days and hours he’d be at his workplace and three ugly stickers. 

Sasuke checked that he had to be there that night and locked his phone with a sigh, without giving a response nor saving the phone number. He really needed to find a way to stop that fucking babysitting thing.

He wouldn’t admit to himself that he was getting used to having a place to go everyday. Not yet.

The day went as usual. He entered the Red Moon, asked for a drink, talked to Naruto for a bit, just until he said something stupid and Sasuke felt the need to storm off to a further table in the stablishment. He didn’t realise it had become a dynamic.

Naruto looked like he couldn’t physically stand knowing he was there every night because of him and just not talk to him. He’d always find ways to sit with Sasuke for a bit and insult him, just until one of them would leave, pissed off by some foolishness.

The first time, the blond had seemed angry at him when he had left without a word. Now, he sometimes smirked and turned around to speak to someone else or welcome a customer.

Sasuke had started just sitting at the counter when he arrived, so he could skip the fifteen minutes it would take Naruto to find some excuse to leave the counter and go to him.

He’d thought it’d be such a drag to be there everyday, just staring at nothing in particular beyond the people who entered and exited the nightclub, but to be honest, he did it even before he _had to_. He had literally an eternity to spare, and he liked that place. The room wasn’t big enough to be filled, neither left space to turn the place into a dancefloor, but wasn’t small enough to give the sensation of being packed next to strangers. The lights, always colored in blue or red, gave intimacy to create little hideouts for the ones who wanted to get away. The ambience was friendly, but not too much. There were no fancy decorations or glittery stuff, besides some posters on the ceiling. The biggest one, which covered half of the ceiling, was a photo of the first step on the moon in 1969, but with the moon beneath the astronaut’s feet red colored. 

He remembered when that happened. Suigetsu had spent three fucking _months_ speaking about it, so proud anyone could have thought he himself had gone to the moon, planted a tree, took a selfie and left on his own.

When the night ended, he’d walk behind Naruto in dark streets and empty alleys. The other had gotten used to it, and fortunately stopped turning around to check he was there every twenty steps. When the entrance door of his flat closed behind blond locks, Sasuke would keep walking until he arrived at his own place, or on some rare occasions, until the sun rose behind high buildings.

This time, it was no different. Sasuke followed the man with half closed eyes, as he knew the path by heart, and counted down every minute left to arrive home.

“Sasuke.” He raised his eyes to Naruto, who had stopped in the middle of the street and turned around to look at him, just two blocks away from the night club. 

“Hm?”

“Wanna go to McDonald’s?”

He sighed. He already knew he didn’t really have a choice. “Not especially.”

“Well, I’m going anyway!” He turned around and crossed the street, now going in an entirely different direction.

He considered going back home and leaving Naruto for the night. It shouldn’t have happened nothing if he had done so. Vampires didn’t have to eat, so it was ridiculous they’d go to voluntarily eat at a fast food chain. Except, maybe Suigetsu would. And Deidara and Kisame, too.

He cursed under his breath and followed Naruto, who exhibited an eternal grin to him.

“This can’t be healthy,” he murmured, getting an excited glance in return.

“I know right!”

“Don’t say that like it’s a good thing.”

They sat at a table next to the playground in the almost empty local. There was another occupied table, with a group of people who seemed to have come back from a party, considering their clothes and their run make up. The girl who was at the counter had sighed when they entered, and couldn’t help pressing her lips together slightly when Naruto ordered two menus for himself alone. At three in the morning.

Now, Sasuke had to face a forced interaction just because the child wanted to eat trash food in the early morning instead of sleeping.

Naruto had sat and quickly started to open all of the closed packages on the tray, eating fries between one and the next. His fingers ran over the straw, unwrapping part of the paper covering it. He took it to his lips, filled his cheeks with air and blew hard in Sasuke’s direction when he thought he wasn’t looking, a small smile on his lips while the paper flew in front of him.

Not that _that_ could surprise Sasuke, though. He caught the paper midair, got it trapped between his index and middle finger, right when it was an inch from his nose.

“You really incarnate the definition of fun police” Naruto whined, with slightly wide eyes, and stuck his tongue out.

“No. I just didn’t agree to babysit a six years old.”

“People in their twenties can have fun, you killjoy!”

“Being annoying is not having fun, last time I checked.” Sasuke left the paper on the table and leaned on the back of his seat, arms crossed.

A string of complaints filled the air, at least until food came in Naruto’s way and he literally couldn’t keep speaking without spitting all the trash food out. Sasuke watched him eat, not too attentive, but curious nevertheless. Solid food had been disgusting for him for a long time now. He knew a long time ago he could’ve kept Naruto’s actual pace at eating, but he didn’t really remember how it felt to do that or to have a full stomach.

“How do you have fun, anyway?” Naruto asked, elbows now leaned on the table. “Do y’all have, like, normal twenty-first century hobbies?”

The image of Suigetsu almost dying of laughter while watching an anime video crossed his mind. “Obviously,” he muttered.

“Then, what do you do?”

“Sleep.”

“‘ _Sleep_ ’, huh?” Naruto’s voice sounded high pitched, as he did an impression of Sasuke. Sasuke, for his part, frowned. “Maybe you fit quite right in this century. You talk like a fourteen years old child with extra manners.” Then he perked up. “Wait, _sleep_? Do you need to?”

He kept his gaze away from Naruto and didn’t answer. The other boy just grunted when he realised he wasn’t going to get an answer, but didn’t say anything more. 

“Why did you come if you aren’t going to order anything?” Naruto asked some minutes later, mouth now full with half a Long Chicken.

Sasuke looked at him for some long seconds, considering if he really wanted to interact with him that night. He closed his eyes for a moment before answering, but decided it wasn’t worth it. Naruto knew why he had come. He grunted at his silence anyway, but his discomfort didn’t show in his actions, as he continued eating fries carelessly. Sasuke wondered how long it would take him to choke if he continued eating at that pace. Every gap in front of him was occupied by food, messy wrap paper or ketchup, spread out on the paper with offers that came as tablecloth for the tray.

Suddenly, Naruto’s head perked up. “Is it because you can’t eat? Is it that?”

He looked like a frightened puppy, like he really was scared if the answer was that he had spent an eternity without a bite of food. Sasuke smirked, and took one of the onion rings in the other’s space. Naruto followed the motion of his hand with his eyes until the onion ring was in front of his mouth, looking as if he was seeing a ghost. 

At the moment Sasuke was about to bite it, Naruto fastly stretched out his arm to take the onion ring from his hands.

Sasuke was obviously faster, though. He reached out Naruto’s wrist tightly and stopped him midair. “What the fuck are you doing?”

“That has an _onion_ inside, you fucking moron!” Naruto’s face, now closer to his, held a surprised grimace. Blue eyes were on his, and his body was absolutely immobile now, his arm still stretched out in his direction. Sasuke turned his eyes to Naruto’s wrist, still in his hand, and let it go with a frown.

“So what?”

“ _Onion_! You could have died!”

Sasuke couldn’t contain a small smile, though. Naruto truly was dumb enough to know vampires existed, and yet say to one them: _you could have died_.

Naruto blinked a few times and scowled, confused at his reaction. Then he leaned back to the back of his chair, moving away his body from above the table. When he spoke, his voice was careful and low. “Aren’t vampires anti-onions? I thought… you know, those legends of hanging a few onions on your doorstep to keep vampires away…?”

Sasuke froze, and his smirk dissolved quickly. 

He didn’t know if he preferred jumping off a cliff or starting to laugh. “You mean garlic.”

Realization hit Naruto's face visibly. His eyes went wide for a second, only to look down, embarrassed, while his mouth parted a bit. “No! They’re very similar!”

“They’re not.”

Naruto’s voice melted into a babblery string of arguments to prove that onions and garlic had things in common. Sasuke stayed silent, and came to the conclusion that probably the other boy hadn’t cooked with garlic in his entire lifetime. Finally, he ate the onion ring in front of an amused Naruto, whose voice converted to silence eventually, as if he hadn’t truly believed that it wouldn’t affect him. 

He couldn’t recall the last time he had eaten, and solid food slided weirdly inside his throat. It was an uncomfortable sensation. This is why he didn’t enjoy eating. “I like garlic, though.”

“But then it doesn’t hurt you?!”

He guessed they were doing this now. The _talking_. “I believe one of us was allergic and created the myth. It's not true as a rule.”

Naruto beamed, and didn’t wait to end the chewing of… something, before talking. “Does that mean y’all can have _allergies_?”

Sasuke sighed and took an extra second to respond. “Yes.” He truly couldn’t comprehend how he could find any detail so fascinating. He got it, vampires were kind of fantasy creatures for regular humans, but reality was a lot less amazing and he should, at least, look _disappointed_.

“ _Wow_. I mean, in fiction it always looks so complicated to kill a vampire. With all the stakes in the chest, and all of that. And now you tell me an allergy can kill you!”

“Even if a vampire is allergic, they can’t get killed by it. It still affects them, so you’d just infuriate them.”

“Oh, makes sense! I think!” Naruto was looking at him with big, big eyes, and a dubious gaze. It was almost humorous to see him so focused while his hands kept going around his food. It was obvious he had gotten nervous suddenly. Not scared, just nervous.

He wouldn’t stop twiddling the straw of his drink, and had put back on the tray half of the burger he had left. For a moment, the only sound in the room were some giggles from the other table, low music from further speakers and the plastic being twitched by Naruto’s fingers over and over.

Sasuke sighed. “Stop that.”

“What?” A startled Naruto blinked twice, awake from his deep thinking. If he could actually deep think, that is.

“The straw” Sasuke indicated with a tilt of his head. “You want to ask something.”

Naruto looked a little troubled. “Yeah, but,” he paused a second, his eyes on his own hands. “I have a lot of questions and I don’t know anything about you or… you know. I don’t want to ask things that’d make you uncomfortable.”

Sasuke snorted, and rolled his eyes. He couldn’t believe this guy was being that ridiculously careful and serious right after trying to prevent him from eating onion because he thought he was gonna die. “If you don’t ask, you’re not going to keep eating and I’ll get stuck with you until dawn.”

The idea of being interrogated wasn’t appealing at all. When he met Sakura, it had been easier than he would have expected, since she asked only the strictly necessary and respected most of his silences. Tsunade already knew about most of the relevant facts, and had informed her properly beforehand. But Naruto hadn’t had the time to know from Sakura.

It was obvious that Naruto just wanted to know for the sake of knowing. He was too dumb to do anything with that information. It was reassuring.

“Alright,” Naruto said, a small smile on his lips. After weeks of loud yelling and bright grins, the awkward, thankful smile was something new. He now held a glimpse of determination in his eyes. “Were you born a vampire?”

That was to be expected. “No”.

“Someone turned you into one, then.”

Sasuke’s gaze stayed steady, not avoiding Naruto’s inquisitive eyes. “All vampires are converted.”

The blond paused a moment, and pronounced the words that most likely were tormenting him before. “Are you dead?”

He lingered. “Not exactly.”

The man in front of him scowled. “What’s that supposed to mean?” he muttered.

“It’s like my body is paused. My heart doesn’t beat, but it doesn’t mean I’ve died.”

Naruto wouldn’t take his eyes off of him. His eyes were wide, attentive, and his brows pressed in a scowl, which showed he didn’t understand a thing. “Your heart doesn’t beat, but you’re alive.”

Sasuke pressed his lips together tightly. “We keep our body functioning by nourishing.” _Consuming human blood_.

Naruto seemed to understand, or at least accept what Sasuke had said, and let his weight fall against the back of his seat, muscles suddenly tensionless. There was a moment of silence between them, in which Naruto just looked down to his food, thoughtful. A couple of locks of golden hair fell against his temple, while taxi’s horns sounded outside and the teens in the room closed the door behind them.

Then blue eyes were up again, and a wide grin appeared right before half a hamburger covered it entirely. “I’ll give you all my onion rings if you tell me if you’re gonna shit them! Or do you have to barf the food? Oh my god, Sasuke, that’d be so _gross_ ”.

A smirk took its place in his lips, and he crossed his arms, relaxed. “You’re a fucking idiot.”

Naruto laughed, brightly. “I want to know, though.”

When there wasn’t any food left to eat, it was already four in the morning. Darkness was still dense in the nighttime, only dissipated by the static streetlights and, sometimes, the moving car lights. They let the door fall close behind them, and walked through known streets to Naruto’s block. The smell of winter was less noticeable each night, as spring was about to come.

For the first time, they walked together. It was not Sasuke being Naruto’s shadow anymore; they walked one beside the other. Naruto couldn’t keep quiet, but his voice was low as a whisper in the night, as if he was scared to wake someone up with a regular voice volume. Which could’ve happened.

“By the way, Sasuke. When you took my wrist earlier?”

“Hm?”

“How were you so goddamn fast? _Fuck_. It’s so fucking _scary._ ”

“You’re just slow.”

“No, _no_. You used your vampire magic and that makes it _unfair_ , bastard.”

“We’re not _magical,_ ” he grunted, slowly, while a frown settled between his brows.

“Yeah, sure” Naruto laughed, and crossed his arms behind his head, stretching out. “You know where you star in, though? Exactly. _Fantasy_ movies.”

“You’re a moron.”

“I’m no werewolf, I don’t know why you say that.” Naruto pushed his shoulder against his, friendly. 

Sasuke pushed him back, less friendly, and nearly made him fall in the middle of the street.

Obviously, Naruto couldn’t let that go. He turned to him, prepared to scream something right before closing his mouth again, now realising he couldn’t scream at four in the morning. That fucking idiot. “You just signed your life sentence, bastard!”

Naruto took a running start in his direction, expecting to charge him with his shoulder as if he was a bull. Sasuke copied his posture and waited for the blow to arrive with a blank face. He had learnt already that it was better not to face Naruto at his obnoxious games, but probably better than letting him win. The blond collided against him, and his angered expression melted into wide eyes and a closed mouth when he couldn’t make him move a single bit.

“What did you say? I couldn’t hear you,” he said, pushing Naruto away and maintaining his emotionless facade.

Naruto hadn’t even steadied himself and was already complaining. “I’m telling you this isn’t fair!”

Sasuke contained the urge to let a laugh escape his throat. He felt embarrassed right after, as he realised it had passed some time since the last time he had felt that, being a foreign emotion. “ _Weak,_ ” he insisted, and started walking again.

Naruto spent the rest of the walk whining, but with every movement radiated energy he really shouldn’t be able to emit that late in the night.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> okay guys, updating every two weeks is going to be difficult from now on and i don't think i can make it :(  
> uni is being pretty hard lately and i don't really have the time for hobbies like this. anyway!! this is not going to be abandoned any time soon ! so please be patient !


	6. fast slow disco (st. vincent)

_Am I thinking what everybody's thinkin'?  
I'm so glad I came, but I can't wait to leave?  
_

_Slip my hand from your hand  
Leave you dancin' with a ghost  
_

_Won’t it beat a slow dance to death?  
_

The sky was still violet on its edges due to the recent twilight and the moon was nowhere to be seen. Naruto walked the streets under a clear sky with a grocery bag tightly held by his hand. The rhythm of the city was more agitated than usual, as a reminder of the beginning of the Saturday night phenomena: full terraces, the sound of laughter and waiters who ran fast in and out bars with trays full of beer or empty jars. 

He knew he had time, but checked the hour on his phone every ten minutes nevertheless. Today he’d have to arrive earlier than usual to the Red Moon, or the manager would kill him. Or Kiba would. 

His gaze was lost in store windows as his feet walked fastly, when he saw something that made him stop and undo his steps, earning a frown from a woman who walked after him and had to dodge him to keep walking. Had he seen right…? Yeah. Yeah, he had. That was Sasuke, in the cafeteria. Naruto could see him through the window pane. He was lost in a small book, and had a steaming cup of coffee in front of him.

Naruto entered the place without a second thought, and found himself standing up, staring at Sasuke. He looked different. Then, he noticed his clothes. Every time they had met they had been in his workplace, so Sasuke usually dressed with shirts and dark jeans. He looked nice in those, and they fit in the context of being inside a nightclub, but Naruto had gotten used to them. Today, however, he was wearing a cream colored jumper.

That was all. It wasn’t a big deal, he looked good as always. But there was something in the scene, the jumper, the coffee, the book, that Naruto felt intimate about. Sasuke knew almost everything about him, but it was the first time he discovered something new about Sasuke. A warm sensation settled inside his chest.

Sasuke lifted his eyes to meet his, not showing any surprise to see him.

“Are you going to take a seat, or do you plan on spending the whole night standing there?”

A blush spreaded on his cheeks with embarrassment, and he silently thanked that Sasuke’s eyes were on his book again. “I didn’t know you liked to come to cafeterias!”

“I usually can’t.”

Oh. Daylight. He forgot, sometimes.

“Well, but you can now! The sky darkens in the late afternoon.” It was still April. By eight and a half, the sky was already a pitch black.

“Hm-hm.”

“So,” he said, leaning on the table, “you coming tonight?”

Sasuke lifted his gaze again to look at him with up, arched brows. A “what do you think?” perfect look. Of course, he was gonna come, Naruto didn’t know why he had asked in the first place. He brought his hand to the nape and giggled a little.

“Kiba’s band will be playing tonight!” he smiled wholeheartedly. “You’ll love it! They play versions from famous rock bands, but they sound great and have one or two original songs already!

Sasuke seemed to examine his expression for a second too long, and didn’t withdraw his eyes this time. “You look excited.”

“I _am_! I am so excited, you don’t know how good they are.”

“You’ll have more work.”

“I don’t care! Also it’s thanks to me that the band is coming and my workmate knows I love them, so I’ll surely have some free time.”

The raven man looked troubled. Well, he didn’t really _look_ troubled, but Naruto has gotten pretty good at reading his grimaces: his lips were slightly twitched, his nose a little wrinkled. 

Some weeks ago, when they’d gone to McDonald's one night, they had kind of started acting like friends. It was not an average friendship, as they only met at night when he had to go to work, but they worked somehow. They spoke a lot, or Naruto spoke a lot. He’d ask him things, a bit about everything, sometimes about being a vampire, other times about him, or sometimes even nothing in particular. Sasuke wouldn’t answer all the time, but he’d always listen and had come to some peace when Naruto had started treating his freaky nature more naturally. He had even started sitting on the counter in the Red Moon, rather than his beloved corner.

This situation was different, though. It felt different. There was no obligation to be there, and yet, Naruto wanted to _stay_ , and keep talking to him. He realised he had been enjoying the other’s company more than he thought.

Naruto laughed out loud, moving away his own thoughts. “Is it that awful for you?”

The other grunted. “I don’t enjoy crowded places.”

“No shit.”

Sasuke sighed and looked at him in the eye. “I’m trying to read.”

“No, you’re not. You would have kicked me out already if that was the case.” Naruto stretched his arm out and tapped Sasuke’s arm, teasing. Sasuke moved his arm away quickly after that. “You really don’t like concerts? I thought you’d be at least a little excited!”

“I told you. I don’t like people.”

“But don’t you like rock music?”

Sasuke shrugged. “Sometimes.”

“You’re truly the most boring person alive.”

“Am I?” Sasuke smirked in his direction. Naruto could tell he was referring to the _alive_ statement more than the _boring_ statement.

“ _Yes_ , you are!” the answer came out a little angered, louder than expected.

He received a strange look as a reply, and Naruto took the chance to look at his phone and avoid talking about it. He should be going if he wanted to get ready properly for the night. He stood up, and smiled at Sasuke.

“I have to go. Call me next time.”

“Hm?”

“So you don’t have to come here alone.” Naruto said, waving, two steps apart from the table already. “By the way, I love your sweater!”

Sasuke kept looking at him weirdly, now with his brows high. Naruto exited the place before letting him say anything.

That night, Sasuke's immaculate arrival record got stained. He had been in front of the Red Moon for ten minutes now, standing under the dim moonlight, listening to the bubbling of intertwined voices that came out of the place like a heavy mist and watching people open the door and get lost in intense, red lights. He looked at the sign which announced the event in big chalk-written words one last time, and then went past the door. Exactly twelve minutes later than usual.

The pub was quite more crowded than it usually was, and there was a small stage with a drum set and other instruments surrounded by lots of wiring and people moving here and there. Even with all the people, it was ridiculously easy to find Naruto, who was screaming and moving to attend every need of the band. He recognised Kiba, a punk looking guy who was talking to Naruto and had red marks painted on his cheeks and a fabric bandana on his forehead.

He found an empty spot some meters afar from the stage, and stayed there for a while with a beer in hand. When Naruto found him, there were only fifteen minutes left for the show to start.

Sasuke felt a twitch in his stomach at the sight of him. Naruto came to him smiling and waving joyfully, glitter shining on his eyelids and a thin shimmery shirt fitting him loosely. A braid was born on the top of his head, and trailed its way down to the back of his neck, where it got lost between blond locks that were free of it. Even if it wasn’t even close to his habitual hairstyle, the locks that escaped his braid made it look less formal and more Naruto-like. It suited him.

“Sasuke! Guess what!”

“What?”

“The boss gave me the night! I'm free!”

“So you're going to spend your free night at your workplace.”

“Hell _yeah_ I am! Have you seen how cool this is? Kiba and his crew are ultimating details and will be playing soon!”

Naruto continued talking to him about the band and his friends, who were spread in small groups all around the place. Even though Sasuke couldn’t recognise any name, he actually remembered some of their faces from the party he went to some months ago.

“Is Sakura coming?”

“Oh,” Naruto seemed automatically saddened. “She has a shift tonight at the hospital and couldn’t sneak out. She’s so upset about it, she has spent the day using crying emojis. But!” he pushed Sasuke’s shoulder, smiling. “I think Hinata’s recording the whole concert, so maybe I’ll ask her for the videos and show Sakura tomorrow.”

“Did she do that for you?” Sasuke said, and pointed at Naruto's braid.

“Ah, this?” Naruto beamed, proud of it. “Yes, she came home to spend the afternoon and did them for me. Do you like it?”

Naruto turned his face to the side to show him the whole braid, smiled brightly, and looked at Sasuke with big, big eyes, expecting a response.

“No.” He didn’t- he really didn’t know why he said that. “It looks weird.”

Naruto frowned deeply and Sasuke regretted, for a second, saying a word. “You’re just old-fashioned. Could you please stop ruining nice things?”

“Do you really think this generation invented braids?”

“No, but maybe it did on men.”

“It didn’t.”

“Then why does it look weird?”

Sasuke shrugged and looked away to the stage while Naruto whined at his side. Suddenly, the red lights started to fade over the audience and grew more and more intense over the stage, until the only lights on the room were red lights on the roof and blue ones on the floor of the stage. Naruto forgot what he was whining about a moment before and started screaming, and Sasuke felt himself be pushed by him and other people around him who were also cheering. He clenched his teeth hard, recognising the habitual spark of discomfort in the deep bottom of his stomach. Kiba stared at the crowd, said two words and automatically Naruto started shouting and whistling like crazy. It was almost ridiculous. 

Sasuke looked at him from the corner of the eye, and saw Naruto’s eyes shining as if they were challenging the spotlights to keep up with them.

As the introduction ended and the beat of the drums began to fill the air, he turned around and started to look for a place to stay which wasn’t in the middle of the crowd. However, he didn’t have the opportunity to make a step out of the place when Naruto’s hand was grabbing his wrist tightly. 

“Oh no no no. You’re not fleeing yet.”

“I’m not leaving. I just want to go over there.” Sasuke said, and pointed at the counter, that stood far from the stage. As far as it could be in the small local, though.

Naruto closed his eyes, and looked at him intensely for a second, and it was only when he closed the space between them and put his face much closer to Sasuke’s that he realized Naruto hadn’t understood a thing with all the noise in the room.

“What?” Naruto screamed into his ear, and Sasuke flinched.

Sasuke grunted and mimicked Naruto’s posture, then talked to his ear. “I can hear you well, don’t scream. I said I’m not leaving. I want to go to the counter.”

The other understood him well enough that time, and didn’t lose time to shoot him a glance that suggested he was crazy. “Ha! As if I’m gonna let you. Just enjoy a little!”

He didn’t remember his wrist was being held until the pressure of Naruto’s hand stopped being there. Naruto started moving to the rhythm of the music, and shouted to the stage excitedly. He wasn’t exactly dancing, it was more like hopping around and smiling in his place. 

The music was actually decent. He could recognise the song being played as a very known Green Day’s song. He wasn’t surprised, since Naruto’s friend looked like someone who definitely would listen to Green Day. People kept singing out loud and bouncing around like Naruto did, and the spotlights changed its colours from red to green arbitrarily. He looked at the blond again, and found the other’s eyes on him.

Naruto’s eyes danced quickly from Sasuke to the side, and then met him again without a hue of discomfort. He wondered what that was about. “Sasuke! You can’t stay there just _standing_. Move a little! Don’t be a drag!”

Sasuke thought of something to say as a response, but he just didn’t find anything which would be worth it. He really wasn't going to give explanations. So he just kept standing there, kept silent and shook his head.

He thought Naruto would start complaining as he always did, but he didn’t. He started laughing, as if Sasuke had done something funny. Not hilarious, but funny. And that was just ridiculous, so he frowned and waited for the other to explain himself somehow, but he just looked back at him without stopping his movement side to side to the music.

“You really aren’t one for parties, uh?” he said, still smiling while he approached him. “Come on, take off the stick up your ass for half an hour!”

Naruto’s hands reached for Sasuke’s, and he scowled deeply. He wasn’t in the mood. He _didn’t want to_ be trapped in one of Naruto’s games, and obviously he didn’t want to _dance_. But when he was about to take a step backwards, he remembered he was surrounded by other people, and his gut took a turn in hunger as a response to that realization. He had eaten before coming because he knew that was going to happen, but it was highly unavoidable when voices and sweat were intertwined in such a small place.

And then the other man was close. He could have dodged the blond’s grip even if he had to stay in his place, and he was so ready for it, but he looked at him and he _couldn’t_. Maybe it wasn’t a physical impossibility, but it was a clear impossibility nevertheless. Sasuke didn’t give a second thought to where this unrealistic reaction came from, though. He heard Naruto’s laugh and just- let him hold both his hands and move him side to side to the music. He really did let him do _that_.

But it didn’t feel near to wrong, even when his head told him so.

However, it wasn’t comfortable for Sasuke. A clenching pressure settled inside his chest, as if there was a beating, steaming muscle inside, which wasn’t the case. Naruto’s fingers held his hands with a firm, gentle grip, and even if the blond was always an exhausting box full of energy, he was holding him with the promise of being steady for them both. Nevertheless, those fingers didn’t cease to be a foreign presence, invading his space, establishing unsolicited contact. 

Naruto’s eyes didn’t meet Sasuke’s all the time, they closed for long seconds, then looked to the people, looked to his friend on the stage. But Sasuke felt they always came back to him and checked if everything was fine. And he couldn’t stand it, he felt as if he was asphyxiating. 

He couldn’t wait to leave, but some deep, almost unhearable voice inside his head was so glad he came.

“If you don’t stop scowling, your face is going to tear apart any second,” Naruto said, his face red from the heat and his lips embracing a gentle smile.

“Then you should stop acting stupid” he responded, after a few seconds, music still loud in his ears.

Naruto suddenly closed the space between them and muttered a “what?”. Obviously he hadn’t heard him, but that stopped being an issue. Sasuke repeated his words in a low voice, but they lost their original tone and turned into a more concerned one. The sudden proximity made him shiver, and right after, he felt his mouth accomodate to the known posture to let his fangs expand. He gasped and repressed it consciously, and exhaled slowly while doing so. His eyes were attached inevitably to the crook of Naruto’s neck, which was close to his own chest.

The other man heard Sasuke’s voice and separated a little, only to show him a concerned look. He knew it didn’t make any sense, but Sasuke felt as if the high pitched sound from the speaker, the intense smell of people and all the simultaneous motion were making every single of his senses go feral. His vision was sharper, his hearing seemed more eager to ignore the music around them, his feet suddenly became heavier on the floor.

“Hey, are you okay?”

Sasuke was focused on his breathing, inhaling heavy, heated air and exhaling it back through his mouth, when he looked back at Naruto. Naruto flinched visibly and opened his mouth slightly.

“I just need to get out,” Sasuke said, as composed as he was able to. When he was turning around, he felt a pressure on his shoulder and moved quickly to avoid it. Naruto looked at him with very open eyes.

“Sasuke, your eyes.”

“I know,” he muttered, and he started pushing people aside to reach the exit of the place. 

People would look mad at him when he was crossing the room, but not that he cared. When he put his foot on the first step of the stairs in the entrance, he felt like running and started walking fast until cold hit his features. A couple who were smoking gave him a look, but he ignored it and doubled the next corner until he found an alley to let himself deflate in.

His back hit the wall and he brought his palms to his eyes and pressed slightly, covering them whole. The change of surroundings was helping notably, and now that panic he had felt was escaping through his pores like steam and dissolving in the air slowly, there was not anxiety but only frustration at himself. 

He didn’t understand why he had done that. Sasuke had been a vampire for a century, and understood the precautions he needed to attend, and therefore had consumed almost a litre of blood before coming to a crowded event. He had gone to this kind of thing before; not usually, but usually enough to _know_ his body and to know how it reacted to _people_.

And now he had scared Naruto off with his eyes turning red.

He breathed in, breathed out and stayed with his eyes closed for a solid minute before opening them again. His vision went blurry for a second before focusing properly on the grey tiles of the sidewalk. He concentrated himself on the small details around: a dry plant that grew between a pair of bricks on the wall, the reflection of streetlights on a store window, the tip of his shoes. He stopped when the customary tingling behind his eye sockets had disappeared, and his jaw wasn’t as tense anymore. His arms fell to the sides of his body, and he looked at the wall in front of him with a defenseless gaze.

Coming inside again was the least appealing thing he could think about at the moment. The memory of Naruto’s face when he had noticed his eyes hit his head again harshly, and the sight of the dark skin of his uncovered neck and his mouth next to his ear came right after it, unwanted. He grunted, defeated.

Naruto stayed inside, his heart beating fast and with his mood clearly destroyed, listening to the music absentmindedly. His head wasn’t there, but spinning around the memory of what had just happened; Sasuke’s red eyes and overwhelmed expression had been alarming to the least. Guilt quickly started to bubble inside his chest like steaming broth. He had assumed all warnings of Sasuke saying he didn’t like crowded places were due to him being a loner, and had almost forgotten that _he consumed human blood_. It made so much sense that he wasn’t eager to go to a concert, where easily almost fifty people could fit in a room like the Red Moon. Fuck.

His legs started moving out before he could even think about it. He wanted to go after him, to say sorry, to check if he was okay. Kiba’s voice became a ringing in his ears as his thoughts accelerated, and people around him became no more than bulges he had to dodge to get out. He moved between people and muttered a quick “sorry” when necessary, until he was almost on the stairs and he felt a pressure on his shoulder.

“Naruto? Naruto!”

It took Naruto a few seconds to come to reality again and realize it was Ino, stunningly dressed and with a friendly look on her face, who was talking to him. At his side, Shikamaru lifted his gaze while leaning on the closest wall.

“Oh Ino! I didn’t realize you were here.”

The girl took him by the arm and shook him a little. “Who would have said you could actually look great! You look amazing, trying to impress someone?”

Naruto laughed, a little tense. “You can’t stop, can you? So, uh, glad to see you, but I need to go outside! See you later! Have fun!”

He stormed off, leaving her no chance to say another word, and went upstairs taking two steps at a time. When the door shut behind his back and the sound of the concert got muffled by thick walls, his eyes went across the whole area, earning him weird looks from a pair of smokers that were speaking calmly.

Obviously, the alley was the first place for him to check. He could almost see Sasuke’s steps in front of him, the memory from the fatidic day they met melting slowly with the scenery around him. A tingling sensation crossed the skin on his neck, where fangs had sunk. The thought dissipated, though, when he actually found Sasuke there. No heated temperature, no stolen glances that lasted too long. Just the raven man leaning on the wall of the nearest building, with the closest streetlight far enough for a shadow to cover his face like a winter blanket.

The man lifted his eyes to meet him, an unsurprised expression on his face. His eyes were no longer bright red, and his respiration seemed to be normal.

“Everything alright?”

“Yeah.”

Naruto got closer, and leaned on the wall next to him. Silence settled between them, a silence he couldn’t remember living with Sasuke. He hadn’t realized he used to fill silences with meaningless conversation until there was nothing else to say. The beat of the speakers from the Red Moon was loud enough for him to hear, so Naruto concentrated on deciphering which song was playing at the moment instead of thinking about complicated stuff.

“They’re playing ‘ _Bring me to life’_ now.”

It took long seconds for Sasuke to answer. “I don’t know that song.”

Naruto turned around to look at him, a surprised grimace on his features. “ _What_!” Without looking at him, Sasuke shrugged. “Oh my god, what the fuck, Sasuke. It’s like, the hymn of the emo generation.”

“Stop looking surprised every time I don’t know something.”

“It’s ‘ _Bring me to life_ ’, Sasuke!”

“Then go and listen to it if it’s that good.” Sasuke’s words slipped without resentment, and Naruto understood. He was giving him the chance to go back inside and have fun, this was his own way of saying: _“it’s alright, don’t waste your time here.”_

“Aren’t you coming?”

Sasuke looked at him, and closed his eyes with disinterest. He visibly thought about the answer before opening up his mouth. “I’m going to stay close to the counter.”

Naruto blinked and quickly beamed brightly, a sincere smile making her way over his cheeks. “Alright! Then let’s go, you gotta listen at least to the end of the song!”

The night passed by smoothly after that. Sasuke had stayed next to the counter, like he had said, and Naruto had stolen some pleased gazes from him when he wasn’t looking, so that, he counted as a victory. He had been with him almost all of the time, but also had gone to check on his friends all around the room. Hinata was still in the front row, recording the show, and was surely very proud of Kiba, told by the shimmery glint of her eyes. Ino and Shikamaru had gone with Neji and Tenten and the girls were bouncing like crazy, which he did too when he met them. 

The clock indicated half past midnight when the concert came to an end. It could seem early, but considering that it was being held in a pub, they needed to make sure there were no complaints from the neighbours, but everything seemed to be alright. Now came the harsh part for the crew, since they had to attend all the people who wanted to have a drink after the show. What a pity that he didn’t work that night, uh?

Naruto looked back at Sasuke, only to realize his eyes were also on him. The raven redirected his gaze to another spot.

“So, I think my friends want to go to Shikamaru’s and buy some drinks. Wanna come?”

Sasuke frowned. “No. But if that’s the case, I’m going home.”

“Uh? Why?”

“If you’re going to an apartment there’s nothing to worry about, idiot.”

Naruto opened his mouth, and closed it up again. _“There’s nothing to worry about.”_ It had been a month already of seeing Sasuke almost everyday, and sometimes he forgot the true reason behind it. He was a bodyguard, not a friend. 

“Right,” he said, placing his hand on his nape and smiling a little. He wanted to ask if he was okay, or if he wanted company on his way home, or something, but he knew any of those things would sound ridiculous and Sasuke would shoot him weird eyes. In any case, he would ask him about what happened that night. But not that day, he guessed. “Sweet! So, uh, call me if you need anything.”

“Good night,” the other nodded, and walked away. Naruto saw him leave and wrinkled his nose a little as he smiled. It was always weird to see Sasuke be such a dork, but then have those good manners when speaking. He always said goodbye and hello in such a polite voice tone.

Again, someone grabbed his shoulder and pulled. “Naruto! There you are.” Ino smiled brightly, and when he turned around, he could see Shikamaru, Neji, Tenten and everyone who was left opening their way to the counter from between the crowd. The density of people was dissipating slowly as the concert had ended, so it was easier to move than before, and soon they were able to create a kind of a circle to stand all in front of the other and speak loosely.

“Where 's Kiba?”

“I think he should be coming soon, but he said we could have a drink while he packs everything,” Hinata said, her voice almost unhearable over the sound of voices.

“Alright! Then let’s obey the boss.” Naruto turned around and asked for a round of beer for most of them (except Hinata, who was abstemious), and they started commenting on the concert excitedly. Even Neji hummed content about it. It had been great, really. He hadn’t realized how seriously Kiba was taking all the music band thing, but the fact that they even have their own songs? Just amazing. His friends were so talented.

“By the way, Naruto, where have you been all night? I’ve only seen you for a while!” Tenten said, sipping through her beer until she had a moustache made out of foam.

Naruto laughed at her and took his hand to the back of his neck. “Oh, I was with a friend of mine! He had to leave early.”

It was weird, being there without Sasuke keeping vigil. His brain had made the connection between the Red Moon and Sasuke so rapidly and it felt wrong if he was there without him. Not that he felt unsafe, but it surely felt wrong, and even his friends’ presence couldn’t change that. He wondered how Sasuke would interactuate with them.

As people in the room moved from one place to another, the group inevitably splattered into small pairs or trios and kept talking, beer in hand. 

Naruto was speaking to Shikamaru when someone crashed into him harshly and he felt obligated to take a step backwards. The person in front of him lost his balance, probably dizzy with alcohol.

“Wow wow, you okay bud?” Naruto said, as he offered a hand to help the man stand.

The man, despite this, lifted his blue eyes to him and showed curved, angry brows and an offended and _loud_ voice. “Uh? What did ya say?!” He had dark, black makeup on his eyes; eyes that lost all their power when they processed Naruto’s face. “Wait wait wait, no. You’re hot.”

Naruto could hear a low _“what the fuck”_ coming from Shikamaru’s direction, who looked more likely to retire and let him handle the situation, but putting an eye on him just in case. On the other hand, he couldn’t reunite the concentration to elaborate words, so he did what he did best: he emitted an embarrassed laughter out loud and muttered: “What?”

Now that he was standing on his feet, the stranger seemed to be approximately his age and had long, blonde hair tied up in a ponytail. The punk clothes he wore could’ve matched the ones Kiba had worn at the concert, and black eyeliner circled both his eyes and stretched them out in large spikes. Naruto didn’t know why, but his appearance made something tickle in the back of his mind that he couldn’t recognise.

“I said you’re hot,” the man said, his voice in a low tone now, as a smirk took dominance on his features. Glassy eyes were looking for something in him, and Naruto couldn’t avoid a grimace to invade his face. The circumstances had become already uncomfortable.

Tension invaded his muscles unavoidably, and he clenched his jaw without a thought. The guy was handsome, and in a situation in which he wouldn’t have been affected by alcohol (or whatever psychotropic he had consumed), he could even have considered accepting the compliment and rolling with it. But this was not it. His gut was twitching and screaming warnings to his brain because _he didn’t want that_.

“Uh, please don’t?” Naruto responded, awkward. 

“Yeah yeah, come with me, I’ll buy you a drink.” Then the man pressed his hands on Naruto’s chest and he could _swear_ he had felt something with a weird.... sticky texture when he had done so. The sensation only lasted an instant, though. The only thought of going with him became not only unattractive, but ultimately _gross_.

He slapped the foreign hands out of him and showed him a direct, unpleasant look. Some people turned around to look at them with slightly alarmed gazes and the anticipation of a fight. Naruto was not going to let a conflict happen, though, that was for sure. “That’s enough. I said no, dude. What the heck?”

The normal thing would have been for the man to insist or to make up excuses, but he didn’t. His eyes were fixed on Naruto, his previous glassy layer now gone and replaced by clear uncertainty. A long second passed until he reacted, and he looked at his hands, then at Naruto, then down at his hands again. “Alright, uhm,” he muttered at the end, now his voice powerless and unsure. The man hid his hands in his pockets and started walking away.

People started minding their own businesses again, and Naruto looked at his shirt, expecting to find a new stain of whatever that guy had his hands covered off. However, he couldn’t find anything weird, so he assumed it was just the sweat after the whole night inside a crowded place. He shot a last glance at the man, who was talking to a redheaded person some meters from them.

Then the blond man looked back at him too, and their eyes met over the crowd. The guy stuck his tongue out in a childish gesture, and he could see for a bit the annoyed face of his companion before the door closed behind them. Naruto was left with a scowl on his face, and ended up also sticking his tongue out at the already closed door.

“Everything alright?” Shikamaru asked, newly on scene.

“Yeah. You know, drunks.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i managed to have it for today and i love how this one went !!! i highly recommend to listen to this chapter's song because what a bop (and it describes very well the situation)
> 
> let me know what you think! <3


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